Lamentations

Unemployed

2011-04-07T19:15:00.000-07:00

Today was the first day I've been unemployed since the six months after I graduated from college in '84. After waking up very early in a rage that made it impossible for me to get back to sleep, the rest of the day improved dramatically. I got some things done. I talked to some people on the phone about legal matters. I posted my resume on a job search site and applied for a non-publishing job in Bayonne (a non-publishing job seems very appealing to me at this point; getting away from some of the pretentious and condescending types the publishing industry tends to attract would be a breath of fresh air, I think). I also applied for unemployment for the first time in my life and felt absolutely no shame in doing so. Overall, it wasn't such a bad day.

J. G. Ballard

2011-02-16T08:18:00.000-08:00

I've been reading short story collections lately. I read The Stories of John Cheever and then Donald Barthelme's Sixty Stories. These two books have literally been sitting on my shelves for thirty years. Well, was it worth the wait? The Cheever contains some great stories ("Goodbye, My Brother," "The Enormous Radio," "The Swimmer," and my favorite, "The Music Teacher"), but when you read them in total as I did the similar themes tend to blur together. I also got the sense (and I may be completely wrong here) that Cheever knew The New Yorker audience and wrote stories with middle-class themes that he knew would resonate with that particular audience. His stories just didn't feel as heartfelt as, say, the stories of Richard Yates that cover similar territory. There's only so much urban/suburban angst and adultery a person can take, so I had to lighten things up pronto which is why I turned to Donald Barthelme. I had never read anything by him before but he was supposed to be funny and witty. I soon learned that what went for funny and witty in the 70s isn't quite holding up today. Of the sixty stories, only one honestly made me chuckle: "The Death of Edward Lear." The rest were sometimes clever, but more often silly or silly bordering on completely meaningless. He was like a more uptight Richard Brautigan, but with less laughs. After these two reading experiences, I needed to return to more familiar territory. J. G. Ballard is one of my favorite writers, but I had never read any of his short stories. With the arrival of The Complete Short Stories of J. G. Ballard after his recent death, I felt like it was time to remedy that situation. I thought I'd start off slow with The Terminal Beach collection, which I had acquired a while ago, mainly because it didn't weigh 10 pounds. Almost immediately I was asking myself why I had deprived myself of such pleasure all of these years. The second story, "The Drowned Giant," is already one of my favorite stories of all time. And in "The Reptile Enclosure" there was this wonderful description of a day at the beach: "Without doubt, he reflected, homo sapiens en masse presented a more unsavoury spectacle than almost any other species of animal. A corral of horses or steers conveyed an impression of powerful nervous grace, but this mass of articulated albino flesh sprawled on the beach resembled the diseased anatomical fantasy of a surrealist painter." Ah, it doesn't get much better than that!

The New Thing

2011-02-15T12:38:00.000-08:00

My new thing is racing to get my pants on before I drop dead suddenly so that I'll escape the ridicule of the police or any other stranger who happens to discover my body. Dying alone is one thing, dying alone with your pants around your ankles is something else. I have even considered wearing bathing trunks in the shower for similar reasons.

David Gates

2010-11-12T07:12:00.000-08:00

Why did it take me so long to discover this writer? I read newspapers and magazines (but not Newsweek) and book reviews and yet it was only recently that I've ever seen his name mentioned (and now I can't even recall where that was). After reading his first novel, Jernigan, I knew that I would have to read everything he's written (another novel, Preston Falls, and a short story collection, The Wonders of the Invisible World). I recommend reading them in that order because there are little inside jokes that travel from one book to the next. Jernigan has been described as having the voice of a grown-up Holden Caulfield but that's just lazy writing. Peter Jernigan is much funnier than Salinger's character. So pick up Jernigan and give this criminally-neglected writer a shot. I think you'll be happy you did. I haven't had this much fun discovering a writer since I found Charles Portis.

A Prayer for a Stroke

2010-10-28T16:48:00.000-07:00

Found myself praying for someone to have a stroke today (take it easy, not a fatal one, just enough to incapacitate this person so that she couldn't continue her hateful ways). Is that wrong? And if so, why does it feel so right (Luther Ingram?)? This was my prayer: "Dear Jesus, if you do me this solid and fell this wretch with a mild stroke, I will be your number one fan and lifelong supporter. Thank you, sir" (a nice touch I thought considering He probably doesn't get a lot of those). I've got my fingers crossed! Is that wrong (again with the Luther Ingram allusion!)

More Franzen fallout

2010-09-30T15:25:00.000-07:00

This article makes some interesting points. Xmastime made similar points in his post about the Franzen frenzy.

A curious connection

2010-08-20T15:42:00.000-07:00

I saw her again at my high school reunion as I had seen her at the two previous reunions. For over twenty years I've held a private grudge against her for firing my brother shortly before he died in a car accident on the way to his new job. She accused him of stealing with absolutely no proof. My brother wasn't a thief. I've wanted to confront her about this, get in her face and let her know how wrong she was all those years ago, but I've always restrained myself. I don't blame her for my brother's death, but obviously her poor judgment set in motion the events that led to his death. And I'm sure she's aware of this. When I ended up behind her while on line at the bar and said hello, she barely responded. That's when I knew she was aware of our curious connection. At that point, nothing else needed to be said.

R.I.P. Bruno S.

2010-08-13T09:36:00.000-07:00

Germany's greatest actor, Bruno S., died this week. He starred in two of Werner Herzog's greatest movies: The Mystery of Kaspar Hauser and Stroszek. He was also a fan of The Mike Show (check out the 2:30 mark of the Sept. 15 show from The Best Show archive for one of my favorite moments from The Best Show). He will be sorely missed.

Inception

2010-07-20T15:08:00.000-07:00

When I saw the trailer for Inception I got that queasy feeling that I get for most movies that seem to be CGI-driven these days. Then I read a review that revealed the plot and my suspicions were confirmed: it sounds like the dumbest thing I've ever heard. Of course I realize that mine will be the minority view and that lots of people I know may even enjoy it. That's fine. I've already accepted the fact that my moviegoing days are dwindling. Let the kids enjoy their new toys. I'll find something else to occupy my time.

Overheard in Hoboken

2010-06-02T10:12:00.000-07:00

A Spanish couple entering porta-johns in Sinatra Park: Woman (roughly translated from the Spanish): It smells like shit! Man: (even more roughly translated from the Spanish): Were you expecting a Picasso painting?

Hippie Lit

2010-05-04T14:56:00.000-07:00

Revisiting a favorite writer from your youth is probably not a good idea. You're almost always bound to be disappointed. So it was with a little trepidation that I embarked on reading the early works of Richard Brautigan (Trout Fishing in America, In Watermelon Sugar, The Abortion, Revenge of the Lawn, and the poetry collections: The Pill Versus The Springhill Mine Disaster and Rommel Drives On Deep into Egypt) that had lain dormant on my bookshelf for over thirty years after I had deemed them "too hippieish" (it didn't help that the books all featured photos of the hippieish-looking author and/or his hippieish-looking girlfriends from the 60s). The books had been purchased in a fit of enthusiasm following my reading of Willard and His Bowling Trophies, The Hawkline Monster, and Sombrero Fallout which I found very funny at the time (I don't think I'll be re-reading them any time soon, so I'll stand by that judgment). Apparently, I surmised that those early books weren't going to provide the same amount of yucks. And now, after having read them, I can't say that I was wrong. Except for The Abortion (which spoils an interesting concept of a library composed exclusively of books contributed by its patrons with a dull and detailed account of a trip to Tijuana for an abortion) and the barely there poetry collection, Rommel Drives On Deep into Egypt, the books were mildly entertaining and only intermittently annoying. Trout Fishing in America is a bit gimmicky at times, but the observations are heartfelt and from a unique perspective. Think Thoreau if he were a hippie. In Watermelon Sugar had a surreal dreamlike quality that made it read like a Tim Burton screenplay (you know you're reading hippie lit when a character jumps into his overalls after making sweet, sweet love to his lady and there's not a pitchfork in sight). So was it worth it? I think so. At least I know now what I had missed out on then. It was like filling in a hole from my past.

Young couples in love in Hoboken

2010-04-21T12:04:00.000-07:00

An old man passing a young couple making out on a park bench smiled at me and said: "They don't know yet." I smiled back and said: "I know. Let's not spoil it for them."

I saw a young couple fighting it out on the street last night. The dude was crying in a theatrical and, therefore, slightly comic fashion while his lady friend couldn't have been more cruel in her utter indifference to his suffering. The dude latched on to this phrase and wouldn't let go: "That shit don't mean shit." And you could tell that he meant it, too.

Overheard in Hoboken

2010-03-19T14:23:00.000-07:00

6-year-old boy to his mother: "Why's he an asshole?" Mother: "Because he is." 6-year-old boy: "But, why?" Mother: "He just is." Was I wrong to assume that they were talking about the poor kid's father?

Shutter Island

2010-02-22T07:48:00.000-08:00

I wish I could say Shutter Island is a good movie, but if I did they would probably have to put me on Shutter Island. My brother says I'm hard on movies. I couldn't disagree.

The Therese and Mike Show

2010-02-19T14:54:00.000-08:00

Therese and I filled in for Tom Scharpling on The Best Show on WFMU this past Tuesday. It wasn't half as scary as our "Childhood Cruelty" show from Oct. 20. Among other things, we discussed our Catholic upbringings, bad neighbors, and Val Kilmer in a Santa suit (everybody's favorite, Xmastime, also checked in again at the 2:32 mark). Listen here.

Avatar

2010-01-27T07:33:00.000-08:00

To keep my mind occupied while watching this elaborate contraption, I kept asking myself, "Am I seeing nipple? Am I at least going to see some blue 3-D nipple in this dumb thing?" It never happened. And every time I thought I was going to see a nice ass it was spoiled by the fact that it had been reconfigured as a horse's ass. Also, despite the record box office, the 3-D wasn't that remarkable. Save your money.

The hideous hand

2009-12-26T11:41:00.000-08:00

I'm only a semi-regular at my uncle's bar, so I'm not familiar with every customer who comes in. One Saturday night, a couple weeks ago, I had hung around after saying hello to my uncle and cousin to catch "Cops" on TV and continue drinking. The color commentary from the regulars during this program can be both funny and withering. While I was watching the show a man about my age sat down next to me. I didn't recognize him. He was in pretty rough shape. He got a drink and proceeded to decline at a rapid rate. He began to fall asleep at the bar and at one point dropped his glass which immediately got him flagged by the bartender. Before that had occurred, I narrowly avoided an altercation with him. When he first sat down, I turned slightly to observe him. Since I had already assumed the universal posture of the defeated (shoulders hunched over my beer, head bent down) I didn't look him in the eye. Instead, my field of vision fell upon his right hand resting on the bar. I may have paused for a moment because I noticed that it was grotesquely gnarled and twisted like some fiendish animal's claw, but it wasn't like I was openly staring at it in stark amazement. But even in as rough shape as this guy was in, he picked up on it and in a voice dripping with contempt he asked, "How's it going, buddy?" I said it was going all right, but in my mind I was thinking, "Things are going to get really stupid now." Fortunately, he was in no shape to escalate the situation and nothing happened. Still smarting from the tone of his query, I began to brood and get angry over his assumption that I was the kind of guy who impolitely stares at the handicapped. If this guy is so sensitive about his clawlike hand, why is he flopping it on the bar like a dead fish so that everyone can see it? Stick it in your pocket. Tuck it away. That's what I would do. Don't wave it around and then get pissed because someone notices your hideous hand. I later learned that he had suffered some sort of drug-related, Crackhead Bob-type stroke which had caused the disfigurement and got even angrier. Talk about taking the fun out of drinking!

Jersey Shore

2009-12-04T11:59:00.000-08:00

Thanks, MTV. By featuring a select group of miscreants on the show, Jersey Shore, you've singlehandedly confirmed the worst stereotypes people have of NJ residents. In a preview for an upcoming episode, a Guido punches a Guidette (sic) in the face. The subjects of this show make the characters from The Sopranos look elegant and sophisticated. No wonder Italian Americans are already protesting.

Happy birthday

2009-11-04T14:12:00.000-08:00

I always miss my mother on my birthday. Her voice was always the first voice to wish me a happy birthday (or sometimes sing it to me) over the phone for many years before she died. I was thinking about this before I went to bed last night and in a dream I couldn't stop crying over her loss. Sometimes my dreams are that obvious.

Out Stealing Horses

2009-10-28T07:24:00.000-07:00

I like Hemingway and the word "and" as much as the next guy, but when it's overdone it becomes an annoying fetish:

"I measure coffee into the filter and pour cold water into the jug and switch on the percolater, and then cut some bread and put it in a basket and get butter out and meat and cheese from the fridge onto plates and fill a small yellow jug with milk for the coffee and put everything on the table with glasses and knives for two."

Over 200 pages of this sort of thing becomes tiring. After reading In the Wake which was only slightly better than Out Stealing Horses, I think I can say I'm officially done with Per Petterson. I guess I prefer my Norwegian writers completely crazy like Knut Hamsun.

"Guyish stuff"

2009-10-26T13:36:00.000-07:00

In this silly article, the writer drops the bombshell that it's a man's world in the Obama administration because there are no women in the pick-up basketball games. Ridiculous. Just as silly is the notion that "comics and Star Trek" is "guyish stuff." Sorry nerds, comics and Star Trek is "boyish stuff." Sports are also boyish, but I give it a pass because it's the universal language of men (i. e. it's what men talk about to avoid talking about anything important).

The Therese and Mike Show

2009-09-02T13:16:00.000-07:00

Therese was kind enough to ask me to join her as she filled in for the ailing Tom Scharpling last night in The Best Show on WFMU slot. The auspicious debut of The Therese and Mike Show on Sept. 1 can be heard here (we also filled in on Oct. 13 and Oct. 20). The hijinks ensue after the very fine set of music that opens the show.

Inglorious nonsense

2009-08-25T17:16:00.000-07:00

I thought Inglourious Basterds was just another dumb Tarantino movie. Here's how I break it down:

Chapter 1: dumb homage to Once Upon a Time in the West, complete with Ennio Morricone music. Since that movie included a family massacre, Tarantino has to rely on it to stage his family massacre. His imagination can go no further than what he's already seen in other movies.

Chapter 2: It occurred to me during the head bashing scene that this is the perfect analogy for watching a Quentin Tarantino movie. The Brad Pitt character even acknowledges this when he comments, pre-head bashing, that it was the next best thing to going to the movies. And sure enough, as the Eli Roth character starts swinging his bat, the audience began snickering and giggling at the jokey violence, Tarantino's trademark, just like the characters up on screen.

Chapter 3: Who knew that what World War II movies were truly lacking was a critique of German cinema. Why? Because Tarantino knows nothing beyond fucking movies (and he's probably too lazy to do any research to come up with anything historically accurate or interesting). This is why the bulk of the movie takes place in a movie theater and we get little side lectures on the flammability of nitrate film. It also looks like Tarantino has a new goofy obsession: strudel with cream. Get ready to see it in future films with his other goofy obsession: women's feet. Also, must he include that soundtrack music from White Lightning in every one of his movies?! Is it in his contract? It's really getting tired.

Chapter 4: A homage to the big shootout in Pulp Fiction (he's even quoting himself now!) except with Nazis instead of dope dealers. Also, another Mexican standoff which may also be in his contract.

Chapter 5: The grand finale that gets the biggest laugh with Pitt's bad accent (a I Love Lucy homage?). Of course, the whole fantasy of killing Hitler is just absurd to begin with, but Tarantino gives it his all. Was that a Dario Argento homage with the ghostly image in the smoke at the end? Who gives a shit?

As I was leaving the theater, I overheard a discussion among a group of elderly women (the old ladies in Bayonne always come out in droves for the most violent movies--it's a little scary). Anyway, one woman asked the group what they thought of it. Of course, they were all reluctant to admit they might as well have just thrown their $7 in the gutter. One woman said that none of it was true (i.e. the premise was dumb) and another woman said that it was funny. And that's it in a nutshell. Obviously I'm in the minority of people who don't find Tarantino cute and funny. And who am I to argue with a bunch of old ladies who want to have a few laughs watching a Nazi get his head bashed in?

The Willie Nelson story

2009-07-16T09:24:00.000-07:00

It just occurred to me that I've never posted my Willie Nelson story; the story I tell everyone I meet who even mentions his name. And since Paul Giamatti (via unconquerable gladness) would like to try out his soul for a day (great choice!) and I'll be seeing him next week with Bob Dylan, I thought now was as good a time as any.

When I was in college I had a work study job in the Admissions office and got to know Barbara and Richard, a married couple from south Jersey. I worked for Barbara all four years, mailing out applications and school bulletins to prospective students. I really hit it off with Richard when he learned I was a country music fan. As a graduation gift, Barbara and Richard gave me a ticket to see Willie Nelson with them at Radio City Music Hall. Over the years after graduating, we kept in touch and occasionally would get together (they lived very close to my aunt and uncle in Forked River, NJ). Several years later I learned that Barbara was seriously ill. The doctors weren't sure what was wrong at first. One thought it might be Mad Cow Disease, one thought it was Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease. After a prolonged and agonizing process, it was finally determined that she had had a stroke and eventually she had to be admitted to a nursing home. While she was in the nursing home, a friend of Richard's who knew Willie Nelson invited him to meet Willie before a show at Great Adventure in NJ. While they were sharing a Lone Star Beer (Richard didn't smoke weed) and talking in Willie's tour bus, Richard mentioned that his wife was in a nursing home. Willie immediately asked him if he could make arrangements for a visit after the show. When Richard called, the nurse who answered the phone didn't believe him (Richard had a reputation as a joker). "Sure, Richard, bring him down," she said sarcastically. So, after the show they drove down to the nursing home. "Where's Willie?" the nurse asked just before she caught sight of the Red Headed Stranger coming around a corner and dropped her coffee. Willie played a couple songs for Barbara and the other patients and staff and probably made a few new fans for life. Although she was unable speak, Richard could tell by the look in her eyes how happy the visit had made Barbara. I wasn't there, but it's an image of Barbara, who died not long after, that I'll never forget.

3 helicopters, 3 boats, 1 dipshit

2009-07-14T07:35:00.000-07:00

I caught the tail end of a rescue mission in the Hudson River yesterday while taking my daily walk after work. Some asshole had jumped into the river, got caught in the current, and began yelling for help. To make matters worse, he refused to grab hold of the life preservers thrown to him from the NYC Police boat that showed up to fish him out (the Jersey City and Hoboken fire departments had also dispatched boats). In order to get him out from under the Frank Sinatra Park pier where he had taken refuge, the police had to lower a raft into the water to go in after him. By this time three helicopters were hovering overhead and about a hundred spectators, including myself, were watching the proceedings over the railing of the pier. A guy next to me, who had been there earlier, informed me that the same guy had pulled an identical stunt a few weeks ago. Observing all the effort being put into the rescue, this really pissed me off. When they finally dragged his ass out from under the pier and onto the boat and the idiot began to wave to the crowd he had attracted (most likely the reason he did it in the first place), I tried to get a chant going: "Throw him back! Throw him back! Throw him back!" I was happy to see that The Jersey Journal didn't even mention the incident this morning, depriving this guy of the attention he so desperately craved.

Another reason to despise cell phones

2009-07-10T14:00:00.000-07:00

One of the downsides of getting a flat screen, high definition television is that you can now see with perfect clarity every moron with a cell phone, sitting behind home plate during baseball games, carrying on like fools because someone can see them on TV. It's annoying to the point of distraction.

The shaving cream clown

2009-07-10T07:07:00.000-07:00

Every morning, just before I begin shaving, I see myself for a brief moment as a clown in his make-up and am tempted to leave my face as is and greet the world as The Shaving Cream Clown.

Fecal Times

2009-07-10T06:56:00.000-07:00

Waking up this morning, I misheard a radio ad for Medieval Times as Fecal Times. Disgusting. After realizing my mistake, I began to wonder if that was intentional, if what I heard was one of those sinister, Freudian, subliminal ads. Then I began to think. Who's to say that in eight or nine hundred years there won't be theme restaurants featuring jousting bouts between Madonna and Michael Jackson and Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie and Osama bin Laden?

Cool mourning

2009-07-08T13:36:00.000-07:00

Watching clips from the Michael Jackson memorial yesterday, I was reminded of a trend I've always disliked: sunglasses as a mourning accessory. What's the point of wearing sunglasses at a wake or a funeral? To shield the world from the fact that you're sad and may have been crying? You're at a funeral, who's going to be offended if you shed a tear or two? It's always struck me as being a bit immature and self-absorbed ("I'm not happy to be here, but at least I can look really, really cool").

Hollywood horseshit

2009-07-06T09:45:00.000-07:00

I didn't have high hopes going into Public Enemies. I had seen some ridiculous quotes from Johnny Depp saying John Dillinger was a personal "hero" of his and the commercials suggested the stylized, glamorized treatment you would expect from Michael Mann. But I had enjoyed the book it was based on and hoped that the well-researched subject matter would prevail. What the hell was I thinking? I should have known that once the material was filtered through the Hollywood dumbing down process that what ended up on the screen would only approximate the facts as presented in the book. A couple scenes were pure fiction: the scene where the FBI physically tortures Dillinger's girlfriend after her arrest (one agent is shown whacking her across the face with a phone book!) and the scene where the agent who has just killed Dillinger kneels down to listen for his last words (there were no last intelligible words; the bullet that killed him had severed his spinal cord and exited above his eye; he died almost instantly). The final scene (also complete fiction) where the agent visits Dillinger's girlfriend in jail to deliver Dillinger's supposedly romantic fictional last words is like a bow placed on a giant pile of shit.

I had avoided seeing Revolutionary Road when it was in theaters because I had expected to be similarly disappointed. I didn't think the movie could live up to the excellent Richard Yates' novel it was based on. I was wrong. It's one of those rare occasions where the filmmaker actually respects the original material and does his best to bring it to the screen. A nice surprise.

A new tradition

2009-06-21T21:37:00.000-07:00

Last year I lamented the rise of fart-themed father's day cards. This year when the first father's day card I picked up involved dear old dad's flatulence, I said to myself, "Fuck it. I'm not going to fight this thing anymore. I'm going to go with it. Obviously, fart-themed father's day cards are a sign of the times and who am I to go against the zeitgeist." So, when I handed my father his card yesterday I said that this was the beginning of a new tradition. From now on I will seek out and purchase the best fart-themed father's day card every year. My father seemed to be cool with it, but I may be wrong.

The baby

2009-06-01T08:55:00.000-07:00

I had a nightmare the other night that was like something out of a David Lynch movie. In the dream I was the father of an unusually large baby girl (my mother collected dolls and one of her dolls may have been the inspiration for this big baby). A friend of mine (not the mother; the mother remained unknown) was assisting me in the care of this child. When I noticed that my friend had placed the baby in a crib full of stringy, cotton-like packing material and that this material was covering the baby's face and had gotten into her mouth, I panicked and quickly attempted to remove the material from the baby's mouth with my index finger. While I was doing this, it became apparent to me that the child was displeased with my action; she began gnawing on my finger. In the instant it took to scoop the material from the baby's mouth, it now became horrifically clear that my finger was no longer in the baby's mouth, but in her eye and that I had just scooped out the poor child's eyeball. That's when I had enough and woke up.

The snickering policeman

2009-05-05T10:33:00.000-07:00

When the policeman entered the vestibule, he could barely suppress a snicker. I couldn't really blame him. To the world, a guy who has fallen for the ruse of a hopeless drunk countless times must appear the biggest fool who has ever lived. I was only the latest (according to the policeman, who was very familiar with the story, I was Fool #5). Her face twisted into an angry red knot, snarling, harsh words were uttered while the offending party and her meager belongings were hastily packed and removed from the premises. Otherwise, it was more civil than I had imagined it. Strangely, the night before I had spent hours in the ER with the very same person (only after spending many stupid hours convincing her that "three beers" wasn't the solution to her physical problem). As sad as the circumstances were, I felt nothing. Any emotional connection that had ever existed had been worn away completely. It ended just as I suspected it would three months earlier when it began.

Two weeks, two funerals

2009-04-17T10:08:00.000-07:00

Just when you think you have problems, life presents an example to make your problems seem puny. On Easter I learned that a childhood friend's sister had died. She was 45. Today I learned that my childhood friend had died. I can't imagine what it must be like for a mother to have to bury two children in two weeks. Or to lose a sister and brother in the same amount of time. And both still young and in their prime.

The aggrieved policeman

2009-04-09T06:30:00.000-07:00

When the policeman entered my kitchen, the first thing he asked was whether I was related to a man with the same last name who taught at Bayonne High School. Since both my parents grew up in Bayonne and still had family in the area, this was not an uncommon question. When I informed him that my father's cousin had taught at the school and asked if he was a good teacher, I didn't get the immediate response I had expected. When he hesitated, I thought I could gain his sympathy by informing him that he had died a couple of years ago, in his fifties, of cancer (I didn't really know the man; I only met him a couple times at family funerals). This didn't really register. Instead, he looked away from me, traveling back in time to the high school class my father's cousin had taught. "Yes, I had him as a teacher," he said, "No, he wasn't a good teacher." He didn't go into details, but it seemed important for him to get this off of his chest even after I had told him that he had died. I could tell by the look on his face that he had been hurt back then (perhaps he had flunked a class) and it was still with him and that this, at last, was his revenge.

Late to the party

2009-04-08T07:27:00.000-07:00

Recently, I was beginning to think that music was losing its hold on me. Nothing grabbed me the way that it used to. Everything sounded like a retread. Had I reached the age where nothing new would interest or excite me the same way it had for the past 37 years or so? Of course, I would have all my old favorites (and there are certainly many of them) to sustain me and make life more bearable, but there was something inescapably depressing about the idea that my musical journey was nearing an end, that my years of active listening would yield less and less fruits in the future. Some may have already sensed a bit of desperation and impending doom in my previous explorations of soft rock. Things got so bad that I was willing to give bands I had previously listened to and not liked that much (The Smiths--sorry, I can't get past Morrissey's voice) or enormously popular bands that I sensed I would not like at all (The Cure--ditto Robert Smith's voice) a try. The results were as dismal as my soft rock foray (all I liked was The Smith's "How Late Is Now?" and The Cure's "Pictures of You" and "Just Like Heaven"). I guess it was in a similar spirit that I picked up a used copy of The Jesus and Mary Chain's compilation, 21 Singles 1984-1998, and haven't stopped listening to it since I first played it a couple weeks ago. The strange thing is that I had bought The Jesus and Mary Chain's album, Darklands, when it came out in '87, but for whatever reason it didn't take hold at the time and I never looked back (strange because I now realize it contains three of my favorite singles: April Skies, Happy When It Rains, and Darklands). I've since gone back to listen to Darklands and their first album, Psychocandy, which I had bought a while ago but never got around to listening to. Unfortunately, aside from the singles included on the compilation, the original albums didn't grab me song for song the way the compilation did. The early singles that got them noticed, and created a controversy at the time that like most controversies seems absurd today, are drenched in feedback (some fans also took offense to their short sets and the fact that they performed with their backs to the audience. Silly, right?). Once the feedback gimmick is dispensed with, it's one great single after another. Moody vocals, evocative lyrics, echoes of the Velvet Underground, The Ronettes, Link Wray, The Beach Boys, The Ramones; what's not to love? So, I guess what I'm trying to say is that the end may not be as near as I thought, that music continues to surprise and exert its mysterious hold on me which is probably another way of saying that I'm not dead yet.

Half a singer midget's weight in a bathing suit

2009-04-02T08:35:00.000-07:00

Since his death in January, I've been reading more John Updike lately. I read The Witches of Eastwick (more sinister and entertaining than the Jack Nicholson vehicle) and I'm currently reading The Centaur. I also read his famous article on Ted Williams, Hub Fans Bid Kid Adieu, to get in the mood for the upcoming baseball season. In the footnoted version of the article that I read (the footnotes aren't included in the linked version), I came across a famous quote from one of Ted Williams' early critics, Bill Cunningham. He said, "I don't believe this kid will ever hit half a singer midget's weight in a bathing suit." A horribly inaccurrate prediction, yes, but also an odd and perplexing (not to mention crude and insensitive) metaphor. The first time I read it I didn't even understand it. The word "singer" threw me off. I mean I grasped that he was trying to imply that Williams' batting average would be a low number, but why was it necessary to also include the midget's occupation? Were singer midgets dramatically lighter in weight than other midgets? I still don't get it.

Treasure Island

2009-03-31T15:16:00.000-07:00

I recently read Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island with the idea that I might be able to recommend it to my niece and nephew in a couple years when they start reading books. For a so-called "children's classic," this thing had a bigger pile-up of corpses than the end of Hamlet. I was appalled. Granted, where pirates are concerned, I should have expected as much, but I thought for the "all ages" crowd there would be more emphasis on the adventure of the treasure hunt and less emphasis on the drunken, violent behavior of the pirates. I was completely wrong. Even Long John Silver with his peg leg and cute parrot turned out to be a double-dealing thug. Like The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Treasure Island isn't really a children's book. It portrays the adult world as treacherous and dangerous at every turn. Whether this is something you would want to expose your kids to at an early age is debatable. My third grade teacher read Edgar Allen Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart" to our class and not only did I never forget it, but it probably single-handedly turned me into a lifelong reader (and I seriously doubt a third grade teacher would be able to get away with that today). On second thought, maybe this extremely violent, ripping yarn is just what kids need. (A note to parents: Treasure Island contains lots of nautical terms that left this landlubber scratching his head a lot of the time. Be prepared to answer questions like "What's a bowsprit?" or "What's the lee-side?" or "What's the forecastle?" or "What's the after-deck?" or "What's a jib?" etc.)

Best Song of the Year

2009-03-30T06:42:00.000-07:00

Synecdoche, New York isn't for everybody (it lost me toward the end), but it did include enough good bits to keep me watching. For those who may not make it to the finish, here is one of the better bits, a eulogy delivered by a priest that builds almost as if it were a song:

Everything is more complicated than you think
You only see a tenth of what is true
There are a million little strings attached to every choice you make
You can destroy your life every time you choose
But maybe you won't know for twenty years
And you may never ever trace it to its source
And you only get one chance to play it out
Just try and figure out your own divorce
And they say there is no fate, but there is
It's what you create
And even though the world goes on for eons and eons
You are only here for a fraction of a fraction of a second
Most of your time is spent being dead or not yet born
But while alive you wait in vain
Wasting years for a phone call or a letter or a look
From someone or something to make it all right
And it never comes
Or it seems to, but it doesn't really
So you spend your time in vague regret
Or vaguer hope that something good will come along
Something that will make you feel connected
Something to make you feel whole
Something to make you feel loved
And the truth is
I feel so angry
And the truth is
I feel so fucking sad
And the truth is
I felt so fucking hurt for so fucking long
And for just as long I've been pretending I'm OK
Just to get along
Just for...I don't know why
Maybe because no one wants to hear about my misery
Because they have their own
Fuck everybody
Amen

Hope

2009-03-26T07:36:00.000-07:00

This morning, on the bus into work, I overheard a man calling everyone he knew on his cell phone to inform them that four people had died in a fire in a building that he had moved out of "less than a month ago." Strangely, this gave me hope. He was very specfic in his details: three women and one man had died in the fire. Although he kept saying how "sad" the news was, you could tell he was also very excited to be able to share this story with anyone who would listen (I'm sure that if he didn't have a cell phone he would have turned to me, a complete stranger, and filled me in on his brush with death). As it turns out, he had been badly misinformed. There had indeed been a fire, but no one had died (one man, the only person in the building at the time, is in critical condition). Strangely, this left me feeling less than hopeful.

Dumb and Dumber

2009-02-11T07:32:00.000-08:00

First Joe the Plumber, now this guy. There seems to be a never-ending supply of dumb guys in this country just waiting in the wings to be hoisted on the public stage for their 15 minutes and celebrated in the media simply for being complete idiots. My first question when I saw this guy: How did he make it past the Secret Service? Are disturbed-looking young men getting a pass these days? Hey, I'm all for the entertainment value that these guys provide, but the way the media (not to mention the president) takes them seriously is deeply embarrassing.

Update: I'm not surprised he's a Yankees fan.

Seriously, it won't be long before this guy gets his own talk show.

Family outing

2009-01-23T16:02:00.000-08:00

I sat behind a family on the Light Rail the other night on their way home from the movies. The parents were probably in their mid- to late-30s and their two boys appeared to be around 11 and 9. The younger boy cried (and/or fake cried) throughout the trip from the Newport Mall in Jersey City to Bayonne. The parents ignored him for the most part, but occasionally the father alternately threatened to punch him in the face if he didn't stop crying and tried to cheer him up with silly quotes from the movie they had just seen. And what movie was that? Notorious, of course, the recent biopic about the life and early death of the rapper Notorious B. I. G. (aka Biggie Smalls). It should also be noted that the younger son was wearing a hooded Scarface parka (for some strange reason that horrible Al Pacino movie continues to be a major influence in hip hop circles) and that the older son tried to impress his father by telling him how his teacher had to break out the Febreze when he let one rip in class. Overall, a heartwarming scene that reminded me of the first movie my parents ever took my brothers and sister and I to: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (a pretty good title for a hip hop song, now that I think about it). It also reminded me of the first R-rated movie I got a parent to accompany me to: the original The Longest Yard (I talked my father into taking me at 13 and sat secretly praying that Bernadette Peters' tits wouldn't come out even as I secretly yearned to see them--I knew the outing was a success when my father laughed during the "I think I broke his fucking neck!" scene).

Growin' up

2009-01-13T13:57:00.000-08:00

My older brother has recently undertaken the monumental task of converting our family photo albums to digital files. Share with me then, the embarrassment of growing up in the 60s and 70s. The bad hair, the outrageous clothes, there's something to amuse just about everyone here (I'm particularly fond of the black and white shot of my bleary-eyed father and my brothers and sister and I in front of a comically small television and what looks like Grandma's rocker from The Grapes of Wrath).

The Wrestler

2009-01-03T13:41:00.001-08:00

I went to see The Wrestler this week. Although it veered dangerously close to cliche throughout (washed-up athlete makes a comeback, stripper with a heart of gold, daughter with Daddy issues), I still enjoyed it. The scenes in the supermarket were particularly moving for me because they were shot in my supermarket (I even recognized one of the deli ladies in one scene). The only downside is that I may never be able to buy cold cuts or cereal again after having been traumatized by this movie.

A Christmas Story

2008-12-23T10:11:00.000-08:00

I recently unearthed this story while rummaging around in some old papers of mine. Loosely based on true events, I used to send it out with Christmas cards twenty years ago when I wasn't such a killjoy and still sent out Christmas cards. Feel free to make it a part of your Christmas tradition. Enjoy!

It was a cold and blustery Saturday night in December. I had left the liquor store where I worked part-time early with plans to attend a friend's annual holiday party in Brooklyn. With my traditional gift (a twelve-pack of Bud) held firmly beneath my arm, I courageously awaited the New Jersey Transit bus bound for Manhattan. When the bus failed to arrive at its designated time, I suggested to the trio of young black women waiting with me that we huddle together to keep each other warm. They all laughed and looked at me as if I were cagey or nuts or both. I guess they thought I was making a joke. It saddened me to think that even as Christmas neared, men and women couldn't put aside their differences and extend to one another the good will and fellowship that our Lord Jesus highly recommended.

Finally, the bus arrived and we boarded. Still smarting with shame, I had a few words with the driver concerning his lateness. He mumbled a few syllables and looked at his watch with a sort of amazed childlike awe. It was as if the watch had suddenly appeared out of nowhere like the proverbial rabbit out of the magician's hat. Dissatisfied with this poor excuse for a reply, I took a seat in the middle of the darkened bus.

No sooner had I removed my coat when a voice from the rear thundered, "Hey buddy, do you want to sell any of those beers?" Either this person had Superman's X-ray vision, for how else could he have known what I was carrying, or else, even in the dark, he had recognized me from the liquor store and had assumed I was taking some work home with me.

"No," I said neither loudly or softly, but like a man as I settled into my seat.

The reason behind this person's inquiry was soon apparent as empty Lowenbrau bottles began to roll from one end of the bus to the other. It was sort of like music if you listened hard enough and didn't care too much for a melody. After a while of this, I reached out and grabbed a bottle as it went rolling by. It was then that I became aware of the two young ladies sitting diagonally across from me.

"Put it on the seat," the one in the aisle seat said pointing at the empty seat across from her and in front of me.

I'm no physics major or anything, but something deep inside told me that this would only be a temporary solution to the problem. I explained my doubts concerning this to her, but complied anyway, knowing how superior I would feel when the bottle went rolling off at the next stop, which according to the laws of nature, it did.

I guess this young woman must have been impressed by my common sense because the next thing I knew she was holding something in front of my face. The bus was too dark to tell what exactly she was offering, so I just said, "What is it?"

"Gum," she said.

By this time the other young woman felt compelled to turn the overhead light on. She must have discovered something interesting in her sweater to pull at because, for the remainder of the trip, this is mainly what she did.

With the light turned on, I was able to get a better look at my fellow travelers. Any fantasy I may have entertained of meeting a mature and beautiful young woman while riding on a bus was instantly dashed. "Biker chicks" would be an unfair, but generally accurate description of these two young women.

"Thanks," I said, accepting her offering.

One thing led to another, as only the sharing of a stick of Doublemint could, and we were fast on our way to becoming deep and long lasting friends. I could tell almost immediately that our friendship would last as long as the length of our bus trip. Since our time together was limited, we opened our hearts to one another in ways that we could never have done, if say, we knew each other or cared even the slightest bit for one another.

"Are you going to New York?" she asked unaware that we were on the NJ Turnpike and that the bus would not be making any more stops until we reached the Port Authority bus terminal in Manhattan.

"Yes," I replied, a little surprised by her question.

She asked me where I was going and I gave her the particulars of the plans I had made for the evening. She acted genuinely interested and inquired whether it was within my authority to extend the party invitation to her and her friend.

"Hell, why not? The more, the merrier, I always say," was how, I think, I replied.

I asked her what she and her friend had originally intended to do when they got to the city.

"We were going to see the tree and buy drugs," she said.

I must admit that at first I was startled by her candid admission. I guess in the hustle and bustle of what I call my life I had ignored the simpler pleasures to be found in it. Although countless commercials on television had reminded me of Christmas' close proximity, I had failed to take notice. If such a thing as "Christmas spirit" can be said to exist, I believe I witnessed it for the first time that night in the twinkling, perhaps stoned, eyes of that biker chick.

When she asked me if I did drugs, I had to admit that it had been a while since I had indulged in that sort of behavior. I didn't feel it was necessary to explain that my experimentation with drugs ended abruptly in my formative years when it became apparent to myself and others that it was seriously meddling with my thought processes. Her question brought back all of that, but it also brought back memories of simple and honest fucked-up good times with my friends. Memories I'll always cherish.

To be reminded once again of the joys of Christmas and drugs together in one shot like that was profoundly moving to say the least. It goes without saying that I never made it to my friend's party that night. Instead, my new friends and I polished off the twelve-pack before we reached the Lincoln Tunnel (I had two while my new friends each had five).

We made a few purchases in the Port Authority (some pot and a few rocks of crack, that new drug everyone was talking about) and smoked it all up in a crowded stall in the second-floor ladies room. When we had run out of drugs and the money to buy more drugs, we staggered over to Rockefeller Center to see the magnificent Christmas tree that had been erected there.

I had seen the tree year after year on television, but had never made the effort to see it in person. I was immediately taken with its enormous size (it was larger than it was on television) and so were my new friends. In fact, when Madge, the one with the sweater, imagined that she could reach up and extend her arms to the star at the top of the tree, she forgot where she was standing and toppled over a railing onto the ice skating rink below. Fanny, the other one, taking her cue, followed suit. I remember vaguely that I would have done the same if it weren't for the fact that I wasn't such a good swimmer, which doesn't make any sense now, but at the time seemed extremely important.

The last time I saw Fanny and Madge they were being led off the ice by a pair of burly security guards on skates who didn't seem to mind being punched and bitten. In fitting with the season, they actually seemed to enjoy it.

I wandered around aimlessly after that, stoned off my ass, getting lost and finding myself on several different occasions. As I roamed the eerily empty streets contemplating the meaning of Christmas under the influence of the various drugs I had taken, I came to a realization akin to spiritual illumination. Suddenly, everything became crystal clear to me. It was almost as if a heavy object had been lifted from my heart. My step grew lighter as I walked along, almost as light as my head which was practically floating away, and I began to look on the bright side of things, something I hadn't done since I was a child. By the time I found my way back to the Port Authority, I had been transformed into another man. I was another man! The person who used to be me no longer existed. Maybe it was the "Christmas spirit," maybe it was the drugs, but that night I came to a realization that would forever change the course of my life. In the hazy, crazy, slipstream of the four corners of my mind, I realized that the story of It's a Wonderful Life was the story of my life and that George Baily and Jimmy Stewart and I were the same person. I realized for the first time in my life that I really and truly am Jimmy Stewart!

The Coupon Genius

2008-12-09T12:41:00.000-08:00

I had to wait more than fifteen minutes behind a coupon genius in the express lane at my supermarket last night. I knew it was going to be trouble when I saw over twenty items (the limit is 5) thrown haphazardly on the conveyor belt, but the other lines were too long to jump to. I decided to stick it out. This was a mistake. After the cashier had rung up all of the items (mostly boxes of frozen vegetables, margarine, and an air freshener), the coupon genius revealed that he intended to pay entirely with coupons. The only problem was that the coupons didn't apply to the majority of the items he had brought to the checkout counter. This meant that the cashier had to rescan all of the items that had to be removed from the sale. Once this was done, the total came to a little over $6 for several boxes of margarine. The coupon genius insisted this wasn't correct. There should be no charge. By this time, I was beginning to lose it. The other customers were growing impatient as well. The woman behind me was doing that "Hmm, hmm, hmm" thing while I took a more direct approach (even if it meant playing into the "angry white guy" stereotype--I was the only white person on line). A manager was dispatched with a magic key that enabled the cashier to start the sale all over again. As it turned out, the coupons did cover the cost of the margarine. For some reason the woman in front of me felt the need to apologize to the coupon genius while also mentioning the funeral of the bus driver who had been stabbed in Brooklyn (I'm still trying to figure out what the connection was). But after he left, she turned to the rest of us on line and said, "Someone's gonna be buttering it up tonight."

Blaming it on the dog

2008-12-02T14:50:00.000-08:00

I was about halfway through my Thanksgiving dinner with the family at my sister's house when I had to excuse myself to wait in the bathroom to throw up. It was the same old routine, only this time I wasn't so sure what was to blame (my best guess was the sausage in the stuffing my older brother had slaved over; he blamed the Coors Light, but I dismissed that as beer snobbery). To make matters worse, it was a long wait. As I was sweating it out, up and down on my knees over the bowl, I thought for a moment the feeling might pass. If I was alone, back at "The Box" (my new nickname for my apartment), I would have stuck my finger down my throat and have been done with it, but because the bathroom was practically next to the kitchen table where my young niece and nephew were eagerly resisting all attempts to coax them into eating the turkey ("It's like chicken!"), I felt it was my duty to avoid puking at all costs. I had heard stories of my niece and nephew getting sick and how the healthy observer had, naturally, gotten a big laugh at the other's expense. I was afraid I was about to become a family legend: "Remember the Thanksgiving when Uncle Mike puked his brains out!"

Earlier, my brand new brother-in-law had regaled everyone with an amusing story (speaking of amusing, a couple days later my younger brother called to ask what our new brother-in-law's last name was; my father and I didn't have a clue). One morning, earlier in the week, my new brother-in-law had observed "drug dealers" trying to break into cars in the parking lot of the development where my sister lives. He called the police. After he described what he had seen over the phone, the police officer replied, "What do you want us to do about it?" "Oh, I'm sorry, I must have dialed the wrong number," my new brother-in-law responded, not missing a beat, "In that case, I'd like to order a large pizza with pepperoni." I had to admit, that was a pretty good zinger. It was so good the police officer put him on hold until another officer got on the line (presumably one more capable of handling zingers from a guy formerly from Jersey City). He didn't fare much better. My new brother-in-law laid into him with another series of zingers when he didn't get the response he was expecting. I told him I loved the zingers, but the zinger overkill might have ultimately worked against him in the end. Generally, cops aren't known for their sense of humor, especially when you're asking them to do something for you. As it turns out, the cops didn't show up until 25 minutes later, long after the drug dealers had moved on.

Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah, sweating it out over the bowl. Things were getting so hot in the tiny bathroom, I thought some fresh air might help bring me around. Since the bathroom was just off to the side of the front door, I thought I could discreetly slip outside without anyone noticing. Wouldn't you know it, just as I stepped outside I coughed up a mouthful of my Thanksgiving dinner and deposited it on the walkway leading to my sister's front door. If that wasn't bad enough, owing to the buttery mashed potatoes I had consumed, the puke was unnaturally luminescent. Anyone stepping outside would have noticed it. What to do? Thinking fast, I grabbed a handful of dirt from my sister's garden and buried it. I had already prepared an explanation in my mind in case I got caught in the act: "Some dog came by and puked on the sidewalk. I was just burying it." Thankfully, I was spared that final humiliation.

The Obama Victory Plate

2008-11-22T13:09:00.000-08:00

This was inevitable, I guess. But what wasn't inevitable is the moment during the commercial when the young white guy writing a letter at his desk pauses to look at the Obama Victory Plate for inspiration. That's when I picked up the phone to order mine!

Sex education (unwittingly)

2008-11-20T08:37:00.000-08:00

I went to see the William Eggleston exhibit at the Whitney Museum yesterday. I like his photographs (if you're a Big Star/Alex Chilton fan you will already be familiar with his work from the Radio City and Like Flies on Sherbert album covers), but I was eager to see the video, Stranded in Canton, that's also part of the exhibit. It's mainly footage Eggleston shot during the early 70s in Memphis, Mississippi, and Louisiana. And since a good part of it was shot in bars in Memphis, it's mostly Eggleston's friends rambling drunkenly and lurching toward the camera. In many respects it's not that different than countless scenes you've probably already seen on Cops (although as far as I know, Cops has never featured a couple geeks biting the heads off of chickens). I'm not quite sure why I would find this so appealing, but it may be because I prefer watching humans in their most natural state: drunk, dumb, and barely civilized.

Later, while exploring the Progress exhibit on another floor, I had to chuckle when a well-meaning mom encouraged her young son and daughter to check out Ammo by Robert Rauschenberg (the NY Times described it as a sculpture of "obscurely erotic images of human body parts silk-screened on plexiglass backlighted by blinking lights"). "Look at the flashing lights," mom said as her kids approached the sculpture. For her sake, I hoped the kids couldn't make out the only images I could: cunnilingus, wide open beaver, and dangling balls mid-coitus.

Not High

2008-11-10T21:28:00.000-08:00

I haven't gotten stoned since I was a junior in high school. My brother was a freshman at Stockton State College in NJ at the time and had access to some really strong shit (Stockton had a notorious reputation as a "party school"). Home for the weekend, we smoked a joint of "Hawaiian" at a party and I got so high that I had to remove myself from the party to sit in the car and contemplate the fact that I had somehow become deceased. Even though I was utterly convinced that I was dead and that my existence had shifted to the astral plane, I had enough sense to wait in the car to be driven home and not embarrass myself any further. I'm not sure how long I sat there alone in the car, but with all the paranoid philosophical pondering going on in my mind, it felt like an eternity. I thought pot was supposed to be fun, like the time my brother and I got a friend to laugh so hard that we thought he might asphyxiate (well, maybe not that fun). What the fuck was this? It sure wasn't my idea of fun. To make matters worse, when I woke the next morning, I realized I still wasn't right in the head. I wasn't as locked in and as paranoid as the night before (I no longer thought I was dead), but I wasn't completely straight either. For about a week, I privately wondered if I might be going insane or if I had done permanent damage to my brain. And, of course, I didn't tell anyone what was going on out of fear that they would think I was really having a mental breakdown. When the effects finally dissipated, I swore off pot for good, which wasn't easy considering the grief I took from a friend (the laughing guy) who was really gung ho for getting high (naturally, he later went on to become a DEA agent) .

Imagine my surprise when I found myself smoking up in the parking lot of a comedy club with an attractive woman in a leopard costume last Halloween night. Would I have been so reckless had the guy dressed as "Sonny Bono after he hit the tree" asked me to spark one up? Probably not. I had just met the leopard lady and figured sharing a joint might make us best friends forever (they're right, high school never ends). On our way out to her car I got a bit of a scare when the leopard lady bragged about the high cost and quality of the weed we were about to smoke. That's when I figured I wasn't going to make it home that night. My friends would have to deal with me as if I were a corpse once I became a toasted, catatonic mummy. It wouldn't be pretty. Fortunately, things didn't end that badly. We smoked up and didn't get high (although I did manage to burn my fingers with my out of practice roach handling). After the leopard lady disposed of the dead roach with a bunch of 0thers under the passenger side car mat (I didn't even raise an eyebrow), we returned to the comedy club. "Are you high?" she asked as we settled back into our seats. "No, are you?" "No." "You got beat," I said using an expression for bum pot I hadn't used since the late 70s. And my friends and I laughed at the verbal flashback.

(Not food)

2008-10-30T19:35:00.000-07:00

I found myself back at my previous favorite Chinese restaurant tonight. My current favorite Chinese restaurant was forced to close a few weeks ago when the building it was in was condemned after some speeding asshole in a SUV bounced off of four cars, flipped onto its roof on the sidewalk, and caused a fire in the building it careened into. He also hit a parking meter with such force that it was projected through a second-story window. Of course, no one in the SUV was severely injured (although a couple of them had to be removed with "the jaws of life"). So, back at my old place, I noticed a new colorful array of specials posted on the wall. Actually, they were the same specials that had been posted before, but someone had decided that different colored paper for each of the specials would present a less drab appearance than all white paper (and it does!). Frantically, I began to search for the sign that had always mystified me. Apparently, my Chinese restaurant has a sideline business selling garbage bags. I guess they get them at such a good discount that they figured they could make a few bucks selling them on the side. The sign never fails to make me smile. It reads: "Garbage (Not food) Bags (1) box for $11 (2) boxes $21." Even more mysteriously, the new sign also included the word "Actual" (quotes included), hovering alone in the upper righthand corner. As you can imagine, that (Not food) has been like a Zen koan to me. I've studied it for years and it still mystifies. I mean, what could the author have been thinking? Is he suggesting that given the chance, Americans might order garbage to eat and be disappointed that the garbage bags aren't edible? Or, perhaps, does it suggest that Americans, barraged by so many foreign words on the menu, might be easily confused, forget what the meaning of "garbage" is, and give it a try along with their pork fried rice? And what does that "Actual" signify now? Were the previous garbage bags only imaginary? Was the previous sign not taken seriously enough? Like me, did other customers think it might be some sort of cosmic joke? Is that "Actual" there to assure them that the garbage bags do, in fact, exist? See what I mean?! The questions are endless!

Politics

2008-10-30T13:44:00.000-07:00

Unlike UG ("the appearance of a winner makes a winner" Really? Is that all there is to it? Have we become this superficial? Does appearance and demeanor trump all? I think you may be right!) or Xmastime ("Obama's alarmingly easy to look at"), I don't have a man crush on Barack Obama. When I saw him speak in Hoboken on behalf of Bob Menendez during his Senate race, I walked away mid-speech, unimpressed. He was so mannered and polished (pundits and the press prefer to say "cool" and "calm") that I wondered if he creaked when he walked, so well-rehearsed in delivering the Democratic platitudes, that it was actually off-putting (even before his recent Oprah-style campaign ad, he reminded me of an infomercial pitchman). I was hoping for something different and all I saw was more of the same (another Bill Clinton disciple, and by that I mean a Democrat who talks about tax cuts and steers just enough to the right to get elected). And when Obama opted out of public campaign financing as the money began to roll in and figured he could outspend his opponent by a huge margin, he revealed himself not as a man of principle, but as a typical opportunistic politician, a camera-friendly alternative to the grating Hillary Clinton, whose timing couldn't have been better.

Before you get the wrong idea, I probably should have prefaced these remarks by saying that I think the country will be better off whoever is elected on Tuesday. As the most moderate Republican nominated in my lifetime, I don't see McCain as the bogeyman that the hyperbolic media is now making him out to be (remember when Reagan's election was supposed to usher in World War III?). McCain's affiliation with the same political party of the current president has been an albatross that even the most liberal of Republicans hasn't been able to shake. I could almost feel sorry for the guy, but then I remember that he is also an opportunistic politician (I have to admit that a part of me hopes he wins just to prove all the worthless political gasbags wrong--that would be almost as entertaining as when the Giants proved all the worthless sports gasbags wrong).

Which brings me to my main point: I have never been inspired by, admired, or respected a living politician in my entire life. Not one. Could this be because I'm from New Jersey and currently reside in one of the most politically corrupt counties to ever exist (all Democrats, btw)? Perhaps. If man is born to fail (and how could it be otherwise), I believe he fails most spectacularly in politics. Look around. Read your history. Everywhere ruination. In what other human endeavor (that doesn't involve a supernatural being) has so much been promised and so little delivered?

"Shut the fuck up!" Part 2

2008-10-21T14:32:00.000-07:00

I wrote about a neighbor, a single mother who constantly screams at her young daughter, in my second post in January 2007. This morning another neighbor lost his patience with her. It was my relatively new neighbor, The Groaner, the one man horror movie soundtrack I've also written about before. Just as I was about to head out for work this morning, he burst out of his apartment into the hallway between his apartment and The Screamer's apartment and let loose with a "Will you shut the fuck up!" that reverberated throughout the building. He continued to berate her at high volume for her various offenses: screaming every morning without any concern for her neighbors and constantly calling her daughter "a stupid idiot" (I've heard her call her "a fucking idiot"). His case fell apart a bit at the end when he turned into The Big Bad Wolf and threatened to kick her fucking door in if she continued with the screaming. I can't imagine what effect this was having on the young girl who has probably been embarrassed by her mother's atrocious behavior numerous times before. I've often felt guilty for not confronting this woman myself in the past. I've held my tongue because I know people can be touchy when it comes to criticizing their parenting skills and didn't want to intrude. As a single guy with no kids, I doubted my argument would carry much weight with her (I always envisioned the conversation ending abruptly with a "Do you have kids?"). I'm hoping this second outburst will have a positive result, but I'm not hopeful. The first outburst quieted her down briefly before the guy attempted suicide and was later removed from the building. I wouldn't be surprised if the cops haven't already visited The Groaner over his threatening remarks. And if The Groaner gets thrown out, does this mean I'm going to have to step up and finally unload on this crazy bitch? Actually, completely losing my shit just might be the thing to cause her to rethink her approach to parenting. I should probably prepare a speech and keep it handy for the day I flip my lid and burst into the hallway raving like my madmen neighbors.

Sickos

2008-10-17T14:14:00.000-07:00

I just saw that someone found this site by googling "spitting orgy." Yuck! Before that the oddest search that led someone here was "masculine joys." I suspect that gentleman (I know it had to be a guy) probably went away somewhat disappointed (no naked men, no joy).

Classing up the joint

2008-10-10T13:01:00.000-07:00

I was about halfway through my jukebox picks (and half in the bag) last week at my uncle's bar, Massa's Tavern, when Chuck Wepner and his entourage (actually, his wife and another couple) walked in. I was in the middle of my Husker Du set of Turn on the News and Celebrated Summer when they arrived. For a man approaching 70, he's still an imposing figure. This wasn't the first time I had met him. The Bayonne Bleeder and I had once donated blood at the same time at the Catholic War Veterans post. Chuck immediately bought a round for everyone in the bar. This is what makes Massa's so great. You go in for a couple beers and before you know it every one's buying you a round. And by the time you reciprocate, you're on your tenth beer. Even more amazing, you can usually do this for less than $20. For a drunk on a budget, it's a dream come true! After a while, the tall man who was with Chuck approached the Internet jukebox. Strangely enough, he was wearing a beret and had unusual facial hair. He seemed to be having difficulty negotiating the jukebox menus. As it turned out, he was having trouble spelling Edith Piaf's last name. I helped him out. Unfortunately, I still had about ten songs to go in my set and he and Chuck left before he got a chance to hear his selection which, of course, was resoundingly sneered at by the regulars. Having felt the wrath of the regulars before, I wasn't surprised. There's only so much class you can take when you're getting your drunk on.

Random clowns

2008-10-06T10:16:00.000-07:00

We're all familiar with the costumed characters (Barney, Big Bird, King Kong, etc.) standing on the side of the road waving at passing cars supposedly to entice drivers into shopping at a particular store. I can't say this marketing strategy has ever worked with me, but the proliferation of these characters along our roadsides suggests it works with some people (people with kids, I reckon). Yesterday, while driving on Route 9, I noticed a group of clowns beckoning before the entrance to a shopping center. Halloween is approaching, I figured, and a costume store had commissioned these clowns to get the word out. A mile or two later, however, on the opposite side of the highway, I saw a lone clown standing and waving in front of a wooded area. What was the point of this random clown? Was he affiliated with the other clowns or was he some sort of renegade clown, waving at cars without a sponsor or proper credentials? These questions led to other more disturbing questions. What if only a small percentage of these roadside characters are connected to commerce? What if a large number of them are really mentally unbalanced individuals who have jumped on the roadside character bandwagon? Or, even more sinister, what if there was a conspiracy afoot to disperse random clowns along our highways just to fuck with our heads and make us buy shit?

Twenty years

2008-10-03T12:17:00.000-07:00

I've been looking forward to getting drunk tonight since yesterday. That can't be good. Twenty years ago today, as William Maxwell put it, "The worst that could happen had happened, and the shine went out of everything." I hope the crowd at my uncle's bar is in the mood for The Ramones, Elvis Costello, The Clash, The Replacements, Husker Du, and The Pogues tonight because that's what I'll be playing. Here's to you, Dave.

Our disgusting national pastime

2008-09-29T15:39:00.001-07:00

Watching the Mets flame out yet again this past weekend on a new large screen, high definition television, it occurred to me that baseball has got to be the most disgusting sport of them all. Where else can you see grown men spitting every five minutes for three hours straight? And, let's face it, when it comes to disgusting habits, spitting has got to be near the top (in my estimation it's more disgusting than picking your nose or scratching your crotch or ass because at least those nasty habits are self-contained; it may even be more disgusting than belching and farting as well, depending on the intensity and smell). And with the breakthrough of high definition television, not only is the spitting right in your face and more vivid than ever, but you can now discern what exactly is being spit up: saliva (usually in short foamy little spurts), sunflower seeds (in a virtual fireworks-like display from the mouth--can someone explain the appeal of sunflower seeds for me? Why not just take some salt and pour it in your mouth?), and tobacco (the most disgusting of them all, especially when the pitcher is doing it since the camera is trained on him for a good part of the game). One of the most shocking moments of yesterday's game for me (aside from the Mets' collapse) occurred when the umpire removed his mask to join in the spitting orgy (his gob was so copious I suspected it included part of his lunch).

Sex and death

2008-09-29T12:39:00.000-07:00

Driving past a funeral home, Joe Mund instinctively swerved his car into the right lane in order to get a better view of a woman standing in front wearing a skintight black dress. Is this what mourning looks like today? What have I been missing?! As he craned his neck one last time to soak in the glorious vision, he caught sight of a coffin being loaded into a hearse in the background just as he was wondering to himself what it would be like to get up in them guts from behind. He drove another block and then hung a u-turn. He was no longer in control. He wasn't sure whether it was sex or death that was driving him, but he was determined to find out.

Now I'm the jerk

2008-09-09T08:28:00.001-07:00

A couple weeks ago a tow truck backed into my parked car on the street in front of my apartment building damaging the hood and bumper. The driver didn't report the incident to the police, but did leave a note with his name and phone number which I was lucky enough to discover a couple days later tucked under the windshield wiper. I called him up and he promised to reimburse me for the repairs as long as he didn't have to report the accident to his insurance company. Although he balked when I suggested I might take it to the dealer, I figured things were still on the up-and-up. On Saturday I got a written estimate from a body shop and called to give him the bad news: $1,700. I left a message and he didn't return my call. I called again on Sunday and left another message with a little more irritation in my voice since he hadn't returned my call from the day before. Again, he didn't return my call. By last night, I was steamed. Is this motherfucker ducking me? Am I going to have to show up on this guy's stoop with a baseball bat (I have a vivid imagination and like to indulge it by imagining myself clobbering people I don't like with a blunt instrument)? I was just hitting my stride in another clearly annoyed harangue when someone picked up the phone to interrupt my message. It was the truck driver's brother, Pat. Gary, the guy who hit my car, was in the hospital with "heart problems." Jesus, is anything easy in this life? Why is it always one fucking thing after another? I calmed down and let him know that I was sorry to hear that. And the fact is I was. I'm always sorry to hear about another guy getting worked over by life because we're all in the thick of it. He's in the shit today, but without fail, I know, I'll be in it tomorrow. Pat told me he would pass on my message to Gary's wife who was still at the hospital (Pat had just stopped by to feed the dog--of course!). As I hung up the phone, I knew the tables had turned: now I was the dick! And sure enough when Gary's son called (I was getting to know the whole family!), I could tell by the tone of his voice that he wanted to be rid of me as fast as possible (he didn't want to make the check out to me, preferring to make it out directly to the body shop). I really had to hand it to Gary. Not only did he fuck up my car, he also managed to lay a massive guilt trip on me. And if he croaks I'll be forever memorialized as the asshole who harassed him while he was on his deathbed. Hey, it's better than not being remembered at all, right?

Favorite moment from last night's convention coverage

2008-09-05T09:18:00.000-07:00

After McCain suggested that more Americans should get involved helping adult illiterates learn how to read, the camera cut to a guy holding a sign that read: "McCain Mavrick." I bet that cameraman was waiting all night for that moment.

The Ass Checker and The Flagrant Farter

2008-09-03T09:44:00.000-07:00

I've previously written about the weirdness that goes on in office bathrooms. I just had another brush with a guy I've come to know as The Ass Checker. While standing at the row of sinks in front of a large mirror, this guy repeatedly turns to check out his ass in the mirror. And it's not even a quick peek to make sure he didn't sit in something, it's a long, very serious observation of the shape and size of his ass. I've never seen a man do this before. It's very unnerving, especially when you're standing next to the guy pretending to wash your hands. Equally unnerving is the behavior of the head of our division who proceeds to have a farting fit while standing at the urinal. I've observed this behavior more than once. He sidles up to the urinal and forces out all of the gas in his bowels while he's relieving himself. As he's laying down these volleys of farts, it's clear that he could care less if anyone else is in the bathroom with him. Being discreet about it doesn't even cross his mind. Maybe he thinks it's some sort of executive privilege. As bad as this is, a co-worker, over drinks, told me that he had made eye contact with the flagrant farter one day standing in the middle of the bathroom with his leg lifted, like a dog, squeezing one out.

Vote for Me

2008-08-21T11:34:00.000-07:00

Some of you may know that my alter ego "Associate Producer Mike" is one of the candidates in the mayubinatorial race in Newbridge currently being waged on The Best Show on WFMU. Last Tuesday the debate was held at the Newbridge Debate Pavilion. You can listen to the debate beginning at the 1:14 mark of the the Aug. 19 show here. Although I may have hurt my chances when I took a controversial stand on banning Little Mikey Halversom from the Newbridge Little League, I think I won the crowd over when I took off my shirt to proudly display my new tattoo of a zeppole (which I'm still not that happy with because a lot of people seem to mistake it for a turd). Now I need your help. Please vote for me here.

Shrugging themselves into oblivion

2008-08-01T21:29:00.000-07:00

Hey, I love an anti-hipster diatribe as much as the next guy, but this is a bit extreme even for me. It's extreme mainly because it takes the hipster far too seriously. The hipster is just a modern day dandy, a 21st century fop, if you will. In the hierarchy of hip, the hipster can barely even compete with the beatnik, the hippie, or the punk. This site does a good job of exploiting the hipster for derision and laughter which may, in the end, be the hipster's most lasting cultural contribution.

More on The Abyss

2008-07-28T08:56:00.000-07:00

After reading yet another article on Heath Ledger's brush with The Abyss, I had to check out The Dark Knight to see what all the fuss was about. So, taking a cue from andtheend., I pulled a two-for-the-price-of-one double feature on Saturday. It worked out perfectly. I caught Wall-E at 11 a.m. (my first ever private viewing--I was the only person in the theater! I felt like a big shot!) and The Dark Knight at 1 p.m. There wasn't even a lag between showings. I took a leak between movies to throw off any overly ambitious snoopy ushers and didn't even have to run a gauntlet to get to the opposite side of the theater (the usual way theaters thwart this type of maneuver). Wall-E was OK. I thought its dystopian future of bloated Rush Limbaughs and Roseanne Barrs was a bit much (I'm not sure what the kiddies would make of it; I'll have to check with my niece and nephew). The Dark Knight was enjoyable for the most part, but felt a little long. I could have done without the confusing sonar cellphone nonsense toward the end that turned the screen into a giant video game (I can't tell you how much I hate that shit!). Heath Ledger's performance as the Joker was fine, but then again, he did have the best role and best dialogue in the movie. Also, the make-up helped a lot. And the tongue wriggling! I'll give him credit for the tongue wriggling. Maybe this is what drove all the critics to such hyperbolic heights (although I suspect the fact that he was dead probably helped). Just to prove my point, after the movie I returned to my apartment and doused my face with baby powder, blackened my eyes with shoe polish, and smeared my mouth generously with ketchup. Then I stood in front of the mirror and wriggled my tongue vigorously. The sight was so horrifying I had to avert my eyes. I think me and The Abyss will have to agree to go our separate ways for now.

Self-examination

2008-07-24T07:24:00.000-07:00

Observed while flipping channels between innings during last night's Mets game: "Why am I watching these assholes in sunglasses running around again?" Answer: "No idea." The best explanation I could come up with is that my tendency to flip to A & E is sort of a reflex now from my unhealthy interest in "The First 48" and "Intervention."

The horror, the horror Part II

2008-07-22T09:20:00.000-07:00

More proof that the sense of shame seems to be diminishing at an alarming rate in human beings. Does he really say, "A dip dip a doo I love you!" at the 1:25 mark? And is she wiping away tears or Corey's spit? I can't stop watching!

Hyperbole

2008-07-19T10:41:00.000-07:00

David Denby goes off the deep end in The New Yorker this week in his review of the new Batman movie, "The Dark Knight." Describing Heath Ledger's performance as the Joker, he writes: "His performance is a heroic, unsettling final act: this young actor looked into the abyss." Really?! Is that all it takes these days to get a gander at the mythical abyss? I never knew "the abyss" was so accessible! And while we're at it, what's so "heroic" about playing a psychotic villain in a comic book movie? Granted, Ledger probably got pretty close to the edge when he took all those pills, but I suspect he lost consciousness before the abyss came fully into view.

The Fall

2008-07-14T15:47:00.000-07:00

The major revelation in Albert Camus' The Fall occurs when the rambling narrator reveals that he witnessed a woman committing suicide by jumping off a bridge and that he did nothing to save her. As callous as that may seem (and it was probably pretty shocking at the time it was written), it almost seems quaint compared to the death of Kitty Genovese or this more recent fall. Ah humanity!

The Problem of Existence

2008-07-12T12:26:00.001-07:00

"When you consider how great and how immediate is the problem of existence, this ambiguous, tormented, fleeting, dream-like existence--so great and so immediate that soon as you are aware of it it overshadows and obscures all other problems and aims; and when you see how men, with a few rare exceptions, have no clear awareness of this problem, indeed seem not to be conscious of it at all, but concern themselves with anything rather than with this problem and live on taking thought only for the day and for the hardly longer span of their own individual future, either expressly refusing to consider this problem or contenting themselves with some system of popular metaphysics; when, I say, you consider this, you may come to the opinion that man can be called a thinking being only in a very broad sense of that term and no longer feel very much surprise at any thoughtlessness or silliness whatever, but will realize, rather, that while the intellectual horizon of the normal man is wider than that of the animal--whose whole existence is, as it were, one continual present, with no consciousness of past or future--it is not so immeasurably wider as is generally supposed."--Arthur Schopenhauer

The Single Life

2008-07-08T09:11:00.000-07:00

I may not have done a lot right in my life, but surveying the wreckage of the marriages of my family and friends, not getting married (or having kids for that matter since they're no longer mutually exclusive) seems to be one of my prouder achievements. At this point, I frankly don't think I have the patience for it (one of the downsides of living alone as long as I have, I guess). I don't believe in "romance" (the couple times I thought I was "in love" I now look back on as periods of mild mental illness). The companionship and regular sex, marriage's biggest selling points, can be great in the early stages, but by most accounts that doesn't last (how could it?!). Sure, the loneliness of the single life can get to some people, but I've never had a problem with it (television and booze are great antidotes). Being single just gives me more time to do what I really want to do instead of being tugged in different directions by my "other half". And before you all start yelling at me for being selfish, think about this: with most households requiring two incomes, marriage has become mainly a financial arrangement (which becomes crystal clear during the divorce proceedings). Getting married to improve your social status is kind of selfish too, no? OK, you can start yelling at me now.

Low Energy Gas Station Attendants

2008-07-08T08:18:00.000-07:00

One of the many things I appreciate about living in NJ is the fact that I don't have to pump my own gas. Manly types will grouse that they like pumping their own gas, but I've found that the Jersey system is faster and more efficient (mainly because it doesn't require my waiting on line in a convenience store behind some doofus with a Slurpee and a Slim Jim and a pocketful of change to pay). But lately I've become aware of a noticeable drop in the energy level of the attendants at the gas stations I visit. Since my gas tank is on the passenger side of the car, this requires the attendant to insert the nozzle into the tank and then walk a maximum of ten feet to my side of the car to take my order. And I'm not asking that he bow and tip his hat at my window; I realize the 1950s are long gone. All I'm asking is that he approach my side of the car so that I can turn and tell him how much I want. It doesn't seem like a lot to ask especially with the price of gas these days. But lately I've been meeting resistance in this seemingly simple procedure. The young, surly, Middle Eastern-looking men who man the pumps can't seem to muster the strength to walk ten feet. Instead they stand on the other side of the car waiting for me to roll down the passenger side window or yell at the top of my lungs or flash the amount with my hands like I'm back in kindergarten. So what I do now is sit there staring straight ahead until he gets the point and makes that colossal effort to take my order. And the looks I get! It's like I've asked him to cross the goddamn Sahara! Fuck you, buddy, and fill it up!

Fat City vs. The Savages

2008-06-27T06:35:00.000-07:00

I watched Fat City (on an old videotape, I think it may be out of print on dvd) and The Savages back to back the past two nights. Fat City is one of my all time favorite movies (the book is pretty great, too). I'm going to go out on a limb and say it is the best boxing movie ever made (yes, even better than Raging Bull which looks like a pretentious arthouse movie in comparison--and I love Raging Bull). And, of course, it's much more than a boxing movie. Stacy Keach plays Billy Tully, a washed up boxer who tries to make a comeback after being inspired by a young amateur named Ernie (a very young Jeff Bridges). Neither one of them has a whole lot going on in their lives in Stockton, California, which looks like it never made it out of the Great Depression. Along the way Tully meets up with Oma (Susan Tyrrell in the best performance of a drunk ever) and things deteriorate quickly. I won't give away any more plot details, but don't expect a Rocky-like ending. Every scene in Fat City feels natural; there's not a false note in the movie. The same cannot be said for The Savages. About halfway through I got the sense that the writer had lost confidence in her ability to handle such a serious subject (adult children dealing with a parent with a terminal illness). Unlike Fat City, it shies away from grim reality by piling on one quirky, unrealistic scene after another (the tennis scene, the neckbrace scene, the fling with the nursing home orderly scene, etc.). Because the characters are so unrealistic (particularly Laura Linney's character), there was no emotional attachment to them at all which was strange considering the heavy subject matter. It was the complete opposite of Fat City where you felt every cutting remark as if it were a punch to the gut. Fat City over The Savages in a knockout.

Pull my finger, son

2008-06-11T07:10:00.000-07:00

Last year I lamented the lack of guilt-free Mother's Day cards. This year, while perusing Father's Day cards, I couldn't help but notice a predominant theme: farting. Judging by the quick sample I took, at least 3 or 4 of the 10 cards I read before settling on the one I bought featured dear old dad as a laughable gasbag. Is this really what it's come to? Has respect for American dads fallen so far that the only thing we can think about when we think about Dad is his recurring bouts of flatulence? Just a couple years ago, I recalled Father's Day cards that poked fun at Dad's attachment to the television remote. Before that it was his less than handy ways around the house. What can we expect after the current farting trend has run its course? Cards gently ribbing Dad about his alcoholism or drug addiction? How about a card that light-heartedly goofs on his philandering or incontinence? Get on it, Hallmark!

The gawkers

2008-06-05T13:28:00.000-07:00

I passed a car accident walking home from work last night. A cable television van and a SUV appeared to have collided head-on a block from my apartment building. Judging from the damage, it looked as though the drivers from either vehicle could have been seriously injured. By the time I passed, the police had already blocked off the street and the injured had been taken to the hospital or were being treated inside the ambulance still on the scene. Of course this didn't discourage the gawkers from gathering in groups on the corner to share what they had seen or heard. Even more gawkers could be seen up the street, their morbid curiosity urging them into action (a regular drunk I recognized from a restaurant I frequent appeared to have been dispatched as a scout to gather information and report back to his drunken cohorts). One woman appeared to have been in such a rush to get to the scene that she hadn't bothered to change out of her pajamas. I didn't stop to ask what happened. I knew that whatever happened, it wasn't good and that knowing the details wasn't going to change that. There was nothing in the newspaper about it today, but I'm not surprised. They need space for more important news like the recent story about a guy who got caught trying to shoplift 48 packs of gum from a Rite Aid.

Scott McClellan's tan

2008-06-03T11:53:00.000-07:00

There was something deeply disturbing about Scott McClellan's appearance on The News Hour last Friday: his tan. It was so distracting I could barely follow what he was saying which, by most accounts, isn't as revelatory as the media would have us believe. It's only been a week since the release of his book, but it already feels like yesterday's news. But that tan! How does an elite Washington D.C. insider acquire such a tan! When his hands fluttered at the bottom of the television screen, they were as dark as a Mexican day laborer's! My guess is that he sensed that this would be his moment to shine before the cameras and, by golly, he was going to do it deeply tanned. Male vanity of this sort is always comical, but I suspect in this instance even George Hamilton would have blushed. Enjoy your moment, Scott; like your tan, it will fade.

Jukebox Zeros

2008-05-20T14:05:00.000-07:00

Xmastime recently lamented the introduction of the internet jukebox (and I lamented, yet again, his fondness for Meat Loaf's Paradise by the Dashboard Light). As someone who has spent an inordinate amount of time in The Turkey's Nest, the increasingly ridiculous hipster hangout in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, I can also attest to the abuses of the internet jukebox. Almost like clockwork on a Sunday afternoon, patrons of The Turkey's Nest can expect to be treated to a set of death metal music (this is a guess on my part since I hardly qualify to judge the differences between thrash metal, speed metal, and the other various metals I may be completely oblivious to--all that shit sounds the same to me) . Every time this occurs I take a quick look round the bar to see if anyone seems to be registering delight or pounding their heads violently against the wall (that's what this music makes me want do!), but I always come up empty-handed. Generally, all I will see are looks of revulsion and bewildered patrons asking each other, "Who's the fuckhead who played this?" Of course, pissing off a crowd of people with bad music may have been fuckhead's original plan to begin with. Maybe that's how he gets his jollies.

And after my experience last Friday night at my uncle's bar in Bayonne which also recently installed an internet jukebox, I can't say I'm immune to the very same private jollies. When I first arrived to catch the Celtics/Cavaliers playoff game (and get drunk), the regulars were playing music I was completely unfamiliar with. It wasn't as horrible as the death metal in Brooklyn, but it was still pretty bad. I think it was pop-metal or hair metal which I'm sure was huge in Bayonne back in the day; Poison, Warrant, Motley Crue and bands of their ilk, bands I only heard intermittently in strip clubs. After that punishing set of music was over, I played a bunch of songs that went over well with the crowd (it wasn't that hard; I stuck to the hits--Rolling Stones, Tom Petty, Faces, CCR, U2, etc.). It was only after I began to play some country music as a favor to the bartender that the crowd began to turn on me. Johnny Cash went over fine, but when the harder stuff (Merle Haggard, George Jones, Gary Stewart etc.) kicked in, I went from hero to zero almost instantly (at one point a young guy across the bar who appreciated some of my earlier selections looked at me in disgust and said, "You lost me, brother"). I have to admit, I found all of the moaning and groaning very amusing. It's not the first time I've witnessed such a reaction. Country music has this effect on a lot of people. And the haters tend to be very vocal in their disapproval. But, by this time, I was so drunk I didn't give a shit. In fact, I was enjoying myself immensely.

Remedial math

2008-05-13T13:15:00.000-07:00

I think I've discovered a new way to save money (or scam the mathematically-challenged). Wait until the cashier has rung you up, then give the cashier the change required to make the next dollar amount. Without the aid of the cash register, I've found that a lot of cashiers seem to be unable to do the most basic math to give you the correct change. Some will be entirely flummoxed and even look to you for help, but some will become so frustrated that they will just guess (incorrectly and to your advantage) what the amount is. Today while purchasing the reissue of The Replacement's "Sorry Ma, Forgot to Take Out the Trash," the price came to $17.11 (no wonder the music business is in the shitter!). I didn't have 11 cents, but I did have a quarter which I handed over with $20 after the cashier had rung it up. This threw the cashier off entirely. I got back $6.14 which was a more reasonable price for a cd, I thought, so I didn't say anything and walked away. Does this make me a thief or did the cashier learn a valuable lesson?

The biggest dunce in the world

2008-05-13T12:43:00.000-07:00

Sean Hannity has got to be the biggest dunce in the world. After pitching a fit today over McCain's global warming speech, dismissing him for "buying into the phony science that doesn't exist," he then spoke with absolute authority about how "God in heaven above gave us the world as a gift." And millions of people in this country take this guy seriously? Listening to Hannity's virtual nervous breakdown, I'm almost tempted to vote for McCain for the effect his presidency would have on him and Rush Limbaugh, who similarly goes into fits whenever McCain veers from the right wing.

"You would know me if you saw me"

2008-04-30T08:01:00.000-07:00

A woman I didn't know left a message on my answering machine last night. She said she was at the Bayonne Medical Center and that she couldn't go into details over the phone. I immediately assumed it was a member of the hospital staff calling to inform me of the latest calamity to befall a self-destructive friend of mine. When I called the number she left, I got no answer, not even a voice mail message. I tried the hospital's general number, but after the usual runaround was unable to get any information on the name the caller had left or my friend's name. I went to bed wondering what was going on. Of course, my imagination kicked in. I dreamt that my friend had "expired" and awoke earlier than usual and was unable to get back to sleep. Since the woman had said that she would be at the hospital through the night until 11 a.m., I tried the number again. This time "Theresa" answered the phone. I gave her my name and reminded her that she had left a message for me last night. After bungling my name ("Lask, Lisle" etc.), she informed me that she had been admitted to the hospital last night and would be homeless when they released her this morning. She wanted to know if she could stay with me. "Do I know you?" I asked, "I don't even know who you are." "You would know me if you saw me." I told her I didn't think so. "Well, OK, just forget about it then." Of course, the question still remains: where did she get my number in the first place? Did she do a random search through the phone book or is word getting out on the street that my apartment is some sort of safe haven for wayward women? I'm not expecting any answers soon.

"A new flavor"

2008-04-21T18:23:00.000-07:00

The confluence of religion, 9/11, and television news readers who can barely think on their feet created a perfect storm of banality when the pope visited ground zero in lower Manhattan yesterday. There were too many idiotic comments made to record here, but the one that stood out for me was uttered by one of those dim-witted Fox News Stepford wives. She said that the pope's visit would "add a new flavor" to ground zero. This comment segued into an equally moronic comment that it was a good thing that the Iranian president's visit to ground zero had been blocked (presumably because it would have added a bad flavor to ground zero, I guess). Equally awkward was when the pope knelt down on his comfy-looking portable kneeler (wouldn't it have been more impressive to kneel down on the ground itself?) and prayed. The pope's people missed a real opportunity here by not having the pope's prayer come in as a voice over on the television broadcast. Instead we got an old guy in a gown kneeling and lots of dead air. At one point I thought I was able to read the pope's lips as he prayed: "One Mississippi, two Mississippi, three Mississippi..." He must have been a little slow on his Mississippis because one of his lackeys had to jostle him as if to say, "That's enough, let's get this show on the road." And after another comic moment where four men in dresses struggled to light a candle ("How many papists does it take to light a candle?"), that's exactly what they did.

Break out the funny hats!

2008-04-19T09:13:00.000-07:00

The pope's in town! Seriously, I must have seen at least five different funny hats on the altar at St. Patrick's in one quick pan during the deadly boring mass that every channel on cable saw fit to cover this morning (a few channels even acknowledged how deadly this was as television by rudely talking over the operatic performance of some hymn). As my mind wandered (how could it not?!), I wondered who manufactured all of these funny hats and whether it was possible for them to make a profit considering the limited quantities produced. I think I may also have finally discovered why priests wear those loose-fitting gowns: the better to pinch themselves to stay awake during mass.

Mourning a loss

2008-04-07T15:07:00.000-07:00

Watching the post-game interview with UCLA's head coach after Memphis defeated his team in the semi-final for the NCAA Championship on Saturday, I was reminded of another sports media absurdity: the interview with the losers. What with the somber tone, the long faces, and the bent heads that losing coaches and players affect (I'm going to give them the benefit of the doubt and assume that much of it is an act because, as we all know, if you lose in America today and don't go into deep mourning, people will assume there is something wrong with you) and the similarly ridiculous manner in which they are interviewed (the interviewer must sound like a policeman informing the next of kin of a murder), you would think that the team had just died in some horrible tragedy instead of merely losing a game. I guess all that talk about "sportsmanship" and being "a good sport" goes right out the window after a big game and everyone is required to act like immature babies. It's pathetic. Just once, I would love to see Jake Byrd from the Jimmy Kimmel show giving the business to some losing coach (Bill Belichick would have been ideal!).

Speaking of death and mourning, my father doesn't seem to be up to the task of informing me when someone I know (or don't know) dies. In the past, my mother would be on the phone before the body had cooled (btw, this is one of the reasons I don't have a cell phone--how would you like to be sitting on a bus or strolling down the street when you got the news that someone you knew or loved died? Inappropriate, right? Which is why I prefer to keep private matters private). Anyway, a couple weeks ago, my father called me at home (a rare enough event in itself) to inform me that his Aunt Mary had died in Bayonne. As far as I can tell, I have never met this person before in my life. My father wanted to know if I would like to go to her wake with him (in the middle of a weekday, no less). This was kind of a surprise to me because I've never thought of myself as someone who goes out of his way to attend wakes. And I think my father knows this about me (as a kid, I found my grandfather's wake, the first I had ever attended, very upsetting; I couldn't understand why a group of people would gather together to gab and laugh it up with a dead body in the same room). I have lightened up somewhat regarding wakes over the years, but I think I'm still too young to look to wakes and funerals as social events the way some senior citizens do. I quickly informed him that I would have to take a pass on his offer. My brother accompanied him to the wake of the elderly woman I did not know and who I'm sure my father hadn't seen or heard from in decades.

This past weekend I learned (a week after the fact!) that the woman who had lived across the street from the house I had grown up in, and known since I was a child, had died. She had been in a nursing home for many years (I can't even remember the last time I saw her--it must have been close to twenty years). Her sons and my brothers and I were constant companions when we were growing up. Thinking back on it, it almost seems like we spent more time in her house than our own. Their backyard was the setting for endless wiffleball games in the summer (we even kept home run stats!). Her basement was where one of her sons, inspired by the movie "Rocky," set up an improvised boxing ring and where I was almost knocked out by the unexpected opening of a laundry room door by her daughter. Their garage was the site of indoor basketball games that rattled their house (once, when I impaled my hand on a protruding nail, I was convinced I had lockjaw as a result of the tetanus I had contracted) and the testing ground for a new sport we had invented called "Tenocky" (basically, hockey played with a tennis ball and rackets). Mrs. B had a gruff side and was a screamer (the sound of her voice screaming her sons names will be forever imprinted in my brain). And although we did have a couple family squabbles (one of her sons tackled my brother in the street once when he tried to make off with a basketball and he required stitches in his knee), my mother and Mrs. B remained friends for many years (they lost touch when Mrs. B entered the nursing home). I fondly remember one afternoon around Christmas when the two moms cut loose with some wine (a singular event which is probably why I remember it) and we bounced from house to house running wild and having a ball. I also recall Mrs. B being so charmed by my tales of Jersey City (for a couple years, my family had set up a summer exchange program with cousins in Jersey City; we loved the city, my cousins hated the suburbs) that she had me repeat the stories for her older daughter.

I don't think I would have attended this woman's wake if my father had informed me in a timely manner (again, I don't go out of my way to attend wakes), but I think my father should have at least realized that this woman's passing was more meaningful to me than an aunt of his that I had never met. To shout the news to me as I walked down the stairs of his house a week after the fact didn't seem quite right. My mother wouldn't have bungled it so badly.

Eat, shit, sleep, and die (for Xmastime)

2008-04-04T07:36:00.000-07:00

As we all know (and spend most of our lives trying to forget), our body has its own agenda and no matter what we do, it will have its way. Its agenda, as far as I can tell, is pretty simple: eat, shit, sleep, and die (for brevity's sake, and alliteration, I include drinking under "eating" and pissing under "shitting"). Nothing reminds us more dramatically of this fact than a bout of diarrhea (vomiting is also a good reminder, and terminal illness the best, but, fortunately, a lot of us will be spared that horrible fate). I was rudely awakened to the body's demands, yet again, the other night when I was caught unawares and outdoors, with my guts squirming, a good distance from my apartment.

For the past couple of weeks, I've been trying to exercise my way out of my annual post-winter funk by walking for about an hour in a nearby park (I've given up the running thing mainly because, at 46, I no longer feel I'm in contention for the Olympics and because I hate every minute of it). Each year at this time, I emerge to move about outdoors (I don't believe in gyms) and shake off the impending depression that I'm sure would descend if I continued to live like a shut-in year round. So, there I was the other night, like some exercise nut, pounding the pavement in a virtually empty park due to the cold wind blowing in off of Newark Bay, when my stomach began to rumble. A smarter person would have cut their exercise routine short to make it back to their apartment in time to take care of business, but I was not that person. A smarter person would have approached the man closing the park's public restrooms and asked politely if he could use the facilities before he locked the door, but I was not that person either. No, I was the guy in control. Mind over matter and all that. I could keep a tight asshole with the best of them, I thought. I must have been about a mile from home when it dawned on me that things were a little more serious than I had suspected. As the sweat began to bead on my brow, I began searching for a dark corner of the park where I could let nature take its course. I had gotten the shits once before in the park years ago, but that was during the summer months when the foliage provided deeper cover. To make matters worse, there was a cop car parked within sight of the area I had in mind (the same area that had previously spared me the ignominy of shitting myself). When I saw the wide trunks of a group of trees providing the darkest shadows for my darkest of deeds, I ducked behind one and dropped my drawers. There's nothing quite like being naked (even if it's just below the waist) in the great outdoors, is there? The cooling breeze to the nether region, the collective unconscious memory of our primal roots as naked brutes scrambling around in the dirt like animals. I had no time for any of that. I parked my back against a tree trunk and let fly as if it was the most natural thing in the world. And it was! Triumphant trumpets blared, celestial choirs rejoiced in song (all in my head, of course)! All was right again! I briefly recalled a former boss of mine who used to moan with pleasure whenever he took a dump. I think I finally understood what that was all about. Joyous thoughts such as these filled my mind as I resumed the upright position and pulled my pants back up. I think I even smiled to myself as I glimpsed over my shoulder the averted catastrophe I had left slumping in a heap against the tree. But in all this merriment, I failed to remember the usual course of my bouts with diarrhea: first wave, solid; second wave, liquid. Maybe I would have walked with a little more urgency if I remembered this instead of sauntering along, almost drunkenly, with relief. But, as we all know (and spend most of our lives trying to forget), there is no true relief in this life; only brief interludes before the ax finally falls. This point was brought home with stark terror as I bounded up the stairs to my apartment building fearing I would make a mess in the lobby or along the staircase. Fortunately, that didn't happen. Unfortunately, it wasn't a complete success either. Another one of life's lessons, I guess.

John Adams

2008-04-03T09:02:00.000-07:00

I'm enjoying the series on HBO, but the over-busy camera work can be quite annoying. Do directors just assume all viewers have some form of attention deficit disorder now and that whenever you have characters talking you have to create all sorts of odd angles (behind a trellis, from the bottom of a stairwell, etc.) to keep people watching? Half the scenes look like they were shot on a rocking boat. It's been so bad, at times, I thought the director might be paying some sort of strange homage to the old Batman series.

Obama just lost my vote

2008-04-01T09:27:00.000-07:00

37?! Did he really bowl a 37?! Good God, man, why even pretend if you know you're that uncoordinated? Eight-year-olds get higher scores than that! Can Bowling Fans For Truth be far behind?

Finally

2008-03-21T07:44:00.000-07:00

They did the right thing, but I still don't quite understand why it's a lesser charge to commit a murder in the midst of a robbery than if you decided to do it well in advance. It's the same decision, isn't it? Anyway, as one of my fellow citizens commented while the jurors were still out: "They need to do the right thing and put this POS away for good." And they did. One down, one to go.

In Cold Blood in Jersey City

2008-03-19T09:25:00.000-07:00

Here's another item for the "We're Doomed" folder. In January 2005 two thugs murdered an entire family in Jersey City during a botched robbery. The first thug, currently on trial, confessed to two of the murders and was photographed using a victim's ATM card at a bank machine. Case closed, right? Not so fast. The jury has been deliberating for nine days now and, as the linked article indicates, it may be because one of the nitwit jurors has watched too many episodes of CSI or Law and Order and fancies himself an amateur investigator or lawyer. Jesus. Hasn't the family of the victims been through enough? Must they also endure the stupidity that passes for justice in this country as well?

The horror, the horror

2008-03-13T13:48:00.000-07:00

American Idol is killing music. Here's the proof.

Michael Clayton

2008-03-11T13:28:00.000-07:00

While watching Michael Clayton, I had a strange feeling of deja vu. Isn't this just a more sinister version of the The Insider? Every thing was well-executed, but on the whole it felt kind of far-fetched and pointless. Did the producers really think that viewers would believe that high-powered law firms have their own professional hit squads? And couldn't the writer come up with a more plausible excuse for the car bomb bungling than Clooney's weird Equus moment? I don't quite understand the Oscar for Tilda Swinton's performance either. All she did was twitch for two hours. Entertaining, I guess, but also instantly forgettable.

Into the Wild

2008-03-07T07:11:00.000-08:00

Two and a half hours is a long way to go to arrive at the most basic truth: "Happiness is only real when shared." And the funny thing is that most people don't have to abandon their families and starve themselves to death to figure this out. Also, Sean Penn turning this misguided young man into some sort of saint in the end was ridiculous. I seriously doubt he croaked in some sort of blissed-out reverie, floating in the clouds, as depicted here.

I'd also like to call a moratorium on Terrence Malick homages. This is the second movie I've seen in as many months that overdoes it (The Assassination of Jesse James being the other). Having said all this, there are many beautiful shots of the American western landscape in this movie. It made me want to see more of it, but with a friend and the occasional stop for a good meal.

For Mom

2008-03-04T15:10:00.000-08:00

Today's her birthday. This would have made her smile.

The Bullshit Era

2008-03-03T19:26:00.000-08:00

While reading Eye Mind: The Saga of Roky Erickson and the 13th Floor Elevators, The Pioneers of Psychedelic Sound, it occurred to me that the late 60s/early 70s must have been a marvelous time for bullshit artists. Take Tommy Hall, the leader of the 13th Floor Elevators, for example. Not only did he talk his way into a band with no other musical talent than making strange amplified noises into a jug, he also convinced his band mates that they could get audiences high by taking LSD every time they performed and "playing the acid" (their LSD consumption was so prodigious that even the Grateful Dead were intimidated). The book goes into far too much detail for the general reader, but it does give you a good sense of the amount of sheer bullshit the culture was swimming in back then. At what other time could a jug player in a band make the following comments and not get laughed out of the room:

"Once you got a high enough vibration, it would be everything. Because "form" is this higher vibration. You can do this because the extension of the vibration is the extension of the cause. You're able to dial yourself up into that geometric structure. The main thing that song, "Slip Inside This House," talked about was how to utilize the systems of your body to free yourself from a dependence on this level of existence."

"One reason I employed the image of the house is that it stands as a symbol of the mind, a mental construction, like a whole place to live. There was one main message: look, we've got the information, if you want the information, then come here and get it, if you don't you won't come at all. As with all callings, everybody snaps to it at different times. All we had created was our own directory to certain levels of spiritual realization."

"Genetics and information with mind-altering or consciousness-expanding drugs. We were able to objectively and scientifically approach acid, where other groups couldn't do that."

Thus spake the jug player. And, as it turns out, "the information" turned out to be rotten. Roky Erikson, the talented but weak-willed lead singer, ended up in a mental institution for three years and has only recently been deemed mentally fit to perform again. Stacy Sutherland, the lead guitar player and the other major talent in the band, had drug and alcohol problems for years after the band broke up until he was shot dead by his wife in a domestic dispute in 1978. And the genius Tommy Hall? Where did he end up? Marooned in a one-room apartment in a $7-a-night flop house in the Tenderloin district of San Francisco with some other casualties of the 60s. He still claims acid is "a teaching machine" and occasionally takes trips within the galaxies contained in a Mickey Mouse poster on his wall. In the most recent photo of him in the book, he looks like Rip Van Winkle which only seems fitting.

Of course, this is not to say the 13th Floor Elevators didn't create some great music. This one is for the ages.

Barber breakdown

2008-03-03T12:39:00.000-08:00

I think I've just entered a new phase with my barber. Nick's been my barber for the past few years. He's an Italian guy in his early 60s. I discovered him in Hoboken after my previous barber disappeared on me (I think she left to pursue a singing career; she eventually came back, but I stuck with Nick mainly because he shaves the back of my neck--he's even got one of those old timey hot shaving cream machines!). Until today, we had an established routine. He cuts my hair and I feign interest in whatever is showing on the Sci-Fi Channel (harder than you would imagine in my case). On occasion I've made a passing remark about some absurd plot point on Battlestar Galactica, but, for the most part, we don't talk. That's one of the things I've always respected about Nick (that and the fact that his magazine rack is abundantly stacked with smut--not just Playboy, but Penthouse, too! Today I saw a porno dvd out in the open! I almost squinted my eyes out of my head trying to read the title! No luck.). Anyway, Nick kept his mouth shut and I kept mouth my shut and everyone was happy. Today, I'm not even in the chair and he starts in about how worked up he is about the current political climate. Is it possible to cry on the inside? Well, that's what I did. Hoping it was a local thing, I tried to steer things in that direction. We yapped about how ridiculously expensive it is to live in this area for a little while and how people love to complain about poor public services at the same time that they're complaining about high taxes and then we moved on to how Corzine wasn't a total jerk because he inherited a lot of the debt that he's been trying to erase by raising tolls and taxes. And then we got into national politics. I figured I'd let Nick take the lead and chime in occasionally to let him know that I was still listening. He started off complaining about how badly Bush had bungled things in Iraq. So far, so good. Then he started complaining about the current crop of presidential candidates. According to Nick, there's no substance to Obama. He's a smooth talker and nothing else (I mentioned that I had seen Obama speak in Hoboken and agreed that he was indeed a smooth talker). After asking me how old I was, Nick compared Obama's rise to Jimmy Carter's rise after the Watergate mess. He also didn't think much of Obama's withdrawal plans and mocked his claims to track down "his brother, Osama" in Afghanistan. After that bombshell, he asked me why Jimmy Carter was elected? "Because Americans wanted a change," I offered. "No," Nick answered, "because his initials were J. C. Get it? They thought he was the return of Jesus Christ." Wow. I'd never heard that one before! Thinking maybe he was a McCain man, I steered him in that direction. He immediately dismissed him as "too old." So, he's a Hillary man. I wasn't expecting that. I expressed my general repugnance to the Clintons, citing the embarrassment that was Bill Clinton's second term (not because he liked blow jobs, but because he didn't know how to get them without turning it into a public spectacle). And, of course, he brought up the booming economy of the 90s which I attributed more to a happy coincidence than anything Clinton actually did (but, hey, all presidents get the credit if it happens on their watch). By this time, he was sweeping the talcum powdered brush across my face (talk about Old School!) and unsnapping the plastic cape. I hope we can go back to how things used to be, but I get a sense we've entered a new era: The Yapping Era. Another little oasis of sanity lost. What's next? Making chitchat with the people who wait for the bus with me? Ugh.

There Will Be More Than Blood

2008-02-19T15:13:00.000-08:00

I watched 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days last night on IFC On Demand. Even with all the accolades it's received, I was a little reluctant to see it. The story of two young women in Romania during the late 80s trying to obtain an illegal abortion for one of them didn't strike me as something I really wanted to watch. It wasn't as disturbing as I feared, but it certainly wasn't without its disturbing moments either. Two scenes in particular were as tense and unsettling as any scenes I've ever seen in a movie. And the director should be given credit for not taking a stand one way or the other in the debate on abortion. He lets the drama play out with all its tragic consequences and leaves it to viewers to make up their own minds. Recommended, but obviously not for those who might be disturbed by the subject matter.

A sick man's dreams

2008-02-15T06:58:00.000-08:00

Now that I've become one of those middle-aged guys who can't make it through the night without a piss break, my dreams are often broken into double features (b. p. b. and a. p. b.). Last night's was a doozy. The first feature included one character after another making lengthy speeches about such things as "The World Food Bank." It was one of those dreams so infuriatingly boring that I'm convinced my waking up was a physiological response to the mental tedium. Upon awakening, I knew exactly what had inspired the dream. Before going to sleep I had listened to an audience recording of a Bruce Springsteen show from his last tour and had become irritated with the loudmouth fans who insisted on talking through most of the songs. Also, it occurred to me that Bruce's political speech before one of his songs was a little condescending (of course he's entitled to his views, but his having to spell things out for his audience with a speech seemed a bit much. Are we too stupid to interpret the songs for ourselves?). Clearly, these minor irritations played a part in the overly chatty and tiresome nature of the dream.

The second feature was a whole other story.

Earlier in the evening I had been thinking about a boy, a friend from my neighborhood when I was 8 years old, who was hit by a car while riding his bicycle, lingered in a coma for several years, and then died. I hadn't thought of him in quite a while and I'm still not sure what made me think of him last night. During the years that he was in a coma, volunteers from the neighborhood had pitched in to help the family with his therapy. My mother asked me to attend one of these sessions with her (it was probably at least a year after the accident). I only went with her once, but for obvious reasons there were certain things about the visit that I have never forgotten. I can still remember the gray light that suffused every room in the house and the hushed voices that the adults spoke in as we were led upstairs to Joseph's bedroom. Joseph, in pajamas, lay in what appeared to me at the time to be an oversized crib (really a hospital bed with sides that could be raised or lowered so he wouldn't fall out). We were encouraged to talk to him to keep his senses stimulated while we raised and lowered his arms and legs and rolled him from side to side on the bed. I remember my mother talking to him continually, but I don't remember saying anything myself (I was probably too mortified by Joseph's physical appearance; he was very thin and he wore a pained and baffled expression on his face as we manipulated his limbs). Naturally, I couldn't wait to get out of there and probably said as much to my mother after we left (this was most likely the reason I never returned). Tied to these memories is the memory of the look on the face of the classmate whose father's car had struck Joseph when another classmate taunted him about it. I don't think I was aware of that fact until that moment and I'll never forget the pained and baffled expression on that boy's face either. Because these boys had to endure these painful experiences at such an early age, they have been forever linked in my mind.

Perhaps because my memory of Joseph's emaciated body reminded me of the concentration camp victims I had seen in films about the Holocaust, the second dream had a Nazi theme. I was in a small farmhouse with stacks of dead Nazi corpses in a bin in the backyard. I had been instructed to start digging graves on the side of the house. As I began to furiously dig several graves at once, a family of corpses rose up from the pile. They weren't dead yet even though their skulls were beginning to poke through their faces! I say a "family" because it was obvious the animated corpses were a man and a woman and two kids. They began to lay down in the barely dug graves. Shocked, I asked them what they were doing. The father spoke for them all, "Why look to the future when the end is so near?"

Huckabee and Rommy

2008-02-06T13:02:00.000-08:00

On Tuesday nights, after The Best Show on WFMU, I take a local bus home through Jersey City. Since it leaves at 11:30 pm, it's usually not that crowded. Often, I am the only white person on the bus. Last night a couple of non-regulars got on without the proper change for the fare. A call was made for five singles, and even though I knew I didn't have it, I made the effort of looking in my wallet just to show them I wasn't blowing off their plea. No one on the bus had five singles. I guess this didn't sit right with one of them because the next thing I know he's shouting something in my direction. I had already resumed reading my book by this time and was trying to ignore the increasingly persistent outbursts from the front of the bus. As it continued, I finally realized what was being said: "Huckabee! Huckabee!" When I looked up, I noticed that another white guy dressed in business attire was sitting directly in front of me (I recognized him as a fellow commuter from Bayonne). I looked at the guy shouting "Huckabee!", but all I got back was the dead-eye stare of the imbecilic or drug addled (he didn't appear drunk to me). It was hard to tell who exactly he was addressing. Now that he had my attention, he began to vary his routine: "Huckabee!" "Rommy!" "Huckabee!" "Rommy!". Then it dawned on me. Because we were both white and didn't look like bums, we must be rich Republicans. Yeah, that makes sense. And since we were rich white people, it goes without saying that we should have been carrying a huge wad of cash on us and were holding out on him and his buddy. I continued giving him my best "What the fuck is wrong with you? Don't you know how to act in public?" look (I've perfected it over the years), but it didn't have much of an effect. Some sort of verbal response seemed required to get him to stop shouting "Huckabee!" and "Rommy!", so I said I had three singles. His buddy almost went for this, but by this time we had reached their destination and the bus driver, eager to diffuse the situation, quickly waved them off the bus without getting their fare. By the creaky way he disembarked (he moved like an old man even though he appeared to be in his late 30s/early 40s), I still couldn't tell whether he had mental problems or was on drugs. Either way, that's no excuse for being a jerkoff.

Primary

2008-02-06T06:55:00.000-08:00

I'm kind of disappointed that New Jersey and New York went for The Schoolmarm. I can't believe that people still fall for that phony, insincere "Clinton charm." What is it? Nostalgia for the Clinton years? The "two presidents for the price of one" bullshit? I'm glad it's still a race and that there's still time for people to be repulsed by Clinton, but it would have been nice to have been spared the regular staged crying jags that now seem to be part of the strategy to make her more human (not to mention the more visible presence of Jack Nicholson on the campaign trail; he left a recorded message on my answering machine yesterday).

On the other hand, it was nice to see moderate Republicans stepping up to reject the candidates approved by the fanatics. The fact that McCain makes Limbaugh and Hannity and their ilk nuts is just icing on the cake.

My ancestors

2008-01-23T18:13:00.000-08:00

As described by Henry Miller in Tropic of Capricorn:

"Some cities you don't even have to pass a night in--just an hour or two is enough to unnerve you. I think of Bayonne that way. I came on it in the night with a few addresses that had been given to me. I had a brief case under my arm with a prospectus of the Encyclopedia Britannica. I was supposed to go under cover of dark and sell the bloody encyclopedia to some poor devils who wanted to improve themselves. If I had been dropped off at Helsingfors I couldn't have felt more ill at ease than walking the streets of Bayonne. It wasn't an American city to me. It wasn't a city at all, but a huge octopus wriggling in the dark. The first door I came to looked so forbidding I didn't even bother to knock; I went like that to several addresses before I could summon the courage to knock. The first face I took a look at frightened the shit out of me. I don't mean timidity or embarrassment--I mean fear. It was the face of a hod carrier, an ignorant mick who would as lief fell you with an ax as spit in your eye. I pretended I had the wrong name and hurried on to the next address. Each time the door opened I saw another monster. And then I came at last to a poor simp who really wanted to improve himself and that broke me down. I felt truly ashamed of myself, of my country, my race, my epoch. I had devil of a time persuading him not to buy the damned encyclopedia. He asked me innocently what then had brought me to his home--and without a minute's hesitation I told him an astounding lie, a lie which was later to prove a great truth. I told him I was only pretending to sell the encyclopedia in order to meet people and write about them. That interested him enormously, even more than the encyclopedia. He wanted to know what I would write about him, if I could say. It's taken me twenty years to answer that question, but here it is. If you would still like to know, John Doe of the City of Bayonne, this is it...I owe you a great deal because after that lie I told you I left your house and I tore up the prospectus furnished me by the Encyclopedia Britannica and I threw it in the gutter. I said to myself I will never again go to people under false pretenses even if it is to give them the Holy Bible. I will never again sell anything, even if I have to starve. I am going home now and I will sit down and really write about people. And if anybody knocks at my door to sell me something I will invite him in and say "why are you doing this?" And if he says it is because he has to make a living I will offer him what money I have and beg him once again to think what he is doing. I want to prevent as many men as possible from pretending that they have to do this or that because they must earn a living. It is not true. One can starve to death--it is much better. Every man who voluntarily starves to death jams another cog in the automatic process. I would rather see a man take a gun and kill his neighbor, in order to get the food he needs, than keep up the automatic process by pretending that he has to earn a living. That's what I want to say, Mr. John Doe."